Be INFORMED

Friday, February 23, 2007

Salmonella Found In Peanut Butter

   Just seems to be getting worse for ConAgra and their Peter Pan brand of peanut butter, my favorite. Of course, the lawsuits have started with 5 having been filed thus far.

          AP                By ANNA JO BRATTON, Associated Press Writer

OMAHA, Neb. — A week after ConAgra Foods Inc. recalled peanut butter from its Georgia plant after a salmonella outbreak, the Center for Disease Control confirmed the presence of the dangerous germ.

   No deaths have been confirmed, although a Pennsylvania family filed a lawsuit Wednesday claiming a relative died from eating tainted peanut butter.

Opened jars from people who were sickened in New York, Oklahoma and Iowa tested positive for salmonella, said Dave Daigle, a spokesman for the CDC in Atlanta.

Leslea Bennett-Webb, spokeswoman for the Oklahoma Department of Health, said the state recovered seven peanut butter jars from 11 cases confirmed by the state, and found the strain of salmonella in at least one.

In Iowa, Kevin Teale, spokesman for the state's Department of Health, said the positive match is from one of the state's six confirmed cases.

 

The family of Roberta Barkay alleges in a negligence and wrongful-death lawsuit against ConAgra that salmonella-tainted peanut butter killed Barkay and sickened her husband and daughter.

Barkay, 76, had been hospitalized with gastrointestinal problems, then developed a bacterial infection before she died Jan. 30, said her lawyer, Rob Peirce.

Her husband, William, was sick with similar symptoms late last year, after the Barkays bought the peanut butter, according to the lawyer and the lawsuit. Their daughter also got sick after eating the peanut butter while at her parents' home for her mother's funeral, Peirce said.

Roberta Barkay was not tested for salmonella, but Peirce said the peanut butter the family ate was part of the batch ConAgra recalled last week. The lawsuit seeks unspecified damages.

Across the country, at least four other lawsuits claim negligence by the company led to the salmonella illnesses.

 

 

Ads by AdGenta.com

0 Comments: