We do our best to report all f— up formula news between making our kids snacks and rushing to playdates. Your paid subscription honors OUR LABOR! Join the union and upgrade to $5 a month.
Here are the top lines:
In 2022, two babies died. Another half a dozen babies were left catastrophically injured and an unknown number were made sick. The families claim it came from drinking tainted formula manufactured by Abbott—in a filthy factory that continues to be plagued by problems
According to reporting by the Wall St. Journal, there was a pile evidence of to to support criminal charges against Abbott
Last week, a decision came down from the top brass at the DOJ to close the investigation
President Trump bought up a bunch of stock in Abbott right before the announcement that the investigation was over
Abbott also contributed $500, 000 to Trump’s inauguration fund
Ok. That’s what we know.
Now, I’m going tell you about a little girl who was left totally disabled due to corporate negligence. And it’s going to break your heart, but I want you to read it. Then I want you to keep reading because I’m here to enrage you (then recruit you).
I want to tell you about Arya.
Arya is four-years-old. She cannot see. She cannot hear. She has trouble sitting up due to muscle paralysis. Yet her little body still emanates that golden light that all young children do. Her mother, Deborah, (who we met through this newsletter) can still communicate with her daughter through adaptive tools and through the imperceptible ways that only exist between mother and child.
Despite being born six weeks early and with a mild heart condition, Arya left the hospital being able to see, hear, move like any other newborn. It wasn’t until she drank tainted formula manufactured by Abbott that she contracted cronobacter and salmonella. At four months-old, Arya’s body was racked with brain-damaging seizures. She will need total care for the rest of her life.
Arya and four other children were catastrophically injured in the 2022 cronobacter outbreak and two additional infants died. This led to a massive formula recall and subsequent formula shortages.
It turns out Abbott had FOUND cronobacter in the plant shortly before the first baby became ill in 2021 but they were slow to react. Then babies started getting sick and a whistleblower warned the FDA about unsanitary conditions in September 2021. Six months later, the FDA inspectors found numerous food-safety violations and five strains of Cronobacter in 20 different places.
A former FDA official later testified before Congress saying that the plant was completely “out of control.”
According, to reporting from The Wall St. Journal, there was “a pile of evidence” to bring criminal charges against Abbott for selling tainted food. Prosecutors interviewed by WSJ, believe that Abbott “knowingly” failed to follow manufacturing standards to protect against the risk of contamination and alleged that Abbott had a “culture of concealment” and “withheld information from FDA related to the presence of micro-organisms” in the factory.
But under guidance from the Trump administration, the DOJ was instructed to find other means to curtail the, uh, criminal impulses of profit driven companies. Prosecution should be reserved for cases in which companies or people “willingly choose not to comply, thereby causing or risking substantial public harm,” the White House wrote in a May 2025 executive order.
In this case, Abbott complied by giving the federal government a deeper discount on their WIC contracts with that, case closed.
Abbott has denied wrongdoing since the specific genetic match for cronobacter that was responsible for the outbreak did not appear in “unopened cans.” This, by the way, is the same legal sidestep that ByHeart used in the botulism outbreak. That sort of legal posturing puts the onus of families and county governments to PROVE that the company’s formula was contaminated. It is a standard defense playbook developed by companies like Abbott and Nestle.
Instead of taking any responsibility for harming infants, Abbott has spent the last three years quietly paying off families whose babies got sick from the outbreak. Senator Elizabeth Warren formally demanded that Abbott disclose how many such settlements it had made and how much it paid out. Abbott has made nothing public.
A few families have chosen to take Abbott to court, pursuing a David-versus-Goliath fight. Arya’s family is among them.
So what does this mean for Arya’s family? Their fight to get justice from Abbott just got a lot harder. Now that DOJ has closed the case, there is no one left to hold Abbott responsible. Only people like Arya’s mom and dad —along with the other mothers who will have to testify about watching their newborns suffer terribly after drinking Abbott’s formula, hoping to God a jury believes them. The litigation will likely go on for a decade.
Who else is standing up for these babies and families?
It is not the companies, it’s not the government, then who?
According to the Lancet blockbuster series on breastfeeding, here’s what it takes to beat back companies big formula companies: “collective mobilization of breastfeeding coalitions, civil society organizations, and women's groups.”
You guys, that’s literally us!!!! No one else can protect mothers and babies like OTHER PISSED OFF, HOPEFUL, ORGANIZED, AND HORMONAL MOMS!!!
Comments
Nothing yet. Say the first thing.
Sign in to join the conversation.