The parents of a Kentucky baby who died last fall After drinking baby formula contaminated with bacteria, they are the latest to sue Abbott Nutrition, the manufacturer at the center of a 2022 crisis that has left millions of Americans struggling to feed their children.
Willow Jade Dellaquila, of Carrollton, Kentucky, was 13 days old when she died on November 5, 2023. She was infected with cronobacter sakazakii, a dangerous germ found in a can of Similac Total Comfort powdered formula used in her baby’s bottles, records show.
“They told me she had a stroke on the right side of her brain,” Cheyenne Ping, mother of 25-year-old Willow, said in an interview. “It’s really heartbreaking. No one should have to go through this.”
Ping and the baby’s father, 26-year-old Christian Dellaquila, can move forward with a lawsuit against Abbott, an Illinois judge ruled Wednesday.
The couple had previously attempted to join a lawsuit with two other families who claim their children suffered devastating brain damage caused by cronobacter linked to a different type of Abbott’s powdered formula, Similac Neosure. Mira White, a baby from Missouri, fell ill with cronobacter in March 2023, at 6 weeks old. Ryker Brown, a toddler from Illinois, was infected with the bacteria in July 2021, at 4 weeks old. Both survived.
But the judge on Wednesday asked that the three cases be dismissed separately, leaving open the question of whether they would be consolidated later.
The original December lawsuit targeted Abbott, whose plant in Sturgis, Michigan, was closed for months in 2022 following similar reports of child illnesses and deaths. U.S. Food and Drug Administration inspectors discovered what the agency’s head, Dr. Robert Califf, called “Shocking” conditionsincluding cronobacter, which led to recalls It is caused shortages which has disrupted US formula supply for more than a year.
Willow consumed formula made at the Sturgis plant and sold at a local Walmart store more than a year after Abbott was placed under court-ordered supervision by the FDA, the Associated Press has learned. The formula that Ryker and Mira consumed was made at the company’s plant in Casa Grande, Arizona, which was the subject of a separate complaint about dangerous conditions, according to federal records.
Documents obtained by the AP show that an April 2023 FDA inspection of the Arizona facility found lapses in contamination prevention protocols, multiple detections of cronobacter at the plant and nearly two dozen complaints of cronobacter, salmonella or other confirmed infections in children who They were fed factory-made formula. Abbott officials said no link was found between the illnesses and the company’s formula, records show.
The lawsuits accuse Abbott of negligence, fraud and failing to warn parents about the potential dangers of powdered formula and demand at least $450,000 per family.
Abbott officials say there is no proven link between the product and any infections, including the cases described in the lawsuit. Each can of Similac says the product is non-sterile and should not be given to babies who are premature or who may have immune problems unless directed and supervised by a doctor.
“No product sealed and distributed at our facilities has tested positive for Cronobacter sakazakii, and we do not believe these claims have merit,” Abbott officials said in an email Wednesday.
In a court filing, Abbott officials argued that there was no common connection between the cases, which occurred at different times, in different states and involved two different types of formulas.
“The fact that each child suffered a Cronobacter infection (months or years apart) is not important,” the company said.
The illnesses highlight the difficulty for regulators and health authorities to control bacteria that are everywhere – but they are also notoriously difficult to detect and track.
Cronobacter bacteria are common in nature, including in water and soil, and are found in home kitchens, including sinks, counters, and even on the spoons used to measure powdered formula. But they can also be found in large factories, where they hide in equipment and the environment.
The ubiquity of the bacteria can make it difficult to determine exactly when it entered formula cans.
Evidence of cronobacter was found in opened cans of Abbott formula in Willow and Mira’s homes and confirmed as the cause of their infections, documents show. But the same strains of bacteria have not been detected in sealed cans of formula or at Abbott plants, federal officials said. It’s unclear how Ryker became infected.
That doesn’t prove the products were free of contamination, said Barbara Kowalcyk, director of the Center for Food and Nutrition Safety at George Washington University. Cronobacter cells tend to accumulate in dry foods, such as formula, and are not evenly distributed, making detection unreliable, if not impossible.
“If you get negative test results, it doesn’t mean as much as a positive test result,” Kowalcyk. “If you get a positive result, you have a big problem. If you get a negative, you don’t know what’s going on.”
This frustrates efforts to detect and prevent cronobacter infections, which are particularly dangerous for newborns and babies born prematurely. These children are vulnerable to illnesses caused by the germ because their immune systems are not developed enough to fight it. In these babies, bacteria can pass from the intestine into the bloodstream and then to the brain, where they can have devastating effects.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention typically receives two to four reports a year of infections caused by cronobacter, although officials believe the count is insufficient. In 2023, four infections were reported to the agency, records show. They included reports of invasive illnesses in Mira and Willow and in an unidentified baby in Maryland who was infected with cronobacter and developed meningitis in December after consuming Similac Advance powdered formula made by Abbott.
The CDC began formal tracking diseases caused by the germ this year. So far, one confirmed case of cronobacter infection in a child has been reported, authorities said, although they did not provide details. Powdered infant formula is the most common cause of cronobacter infections in babies, the agency said.
The 2022 Abbott crisis led Congress and federal investigators to sharply criticize the FDA’s oversight of infant formula. In a hard-hitting audit issued in June, federal investigators found that the agency took 15 months to respond to a whistleblower report about the Sturgis plant and lacked basic safeguards to prevent dangerous and deadly infections.
The FDA says it has renewed oversight by creating a new human food program and revamped how officials respond to reports of contamination, illnesses and deaths associated with infant formula. The audit “represents a snapshot in time and the FDA continues to make progress,” the agency said in a statement.
Jim Jones, head of the program, said inspection issues, consumer complaints and whistleblower reports will now be routed to a single office.
“This will make it easier for us to be faster at identifying a signal,” he said in a recent interview.
But for Willow’s family, these changes come too late. Ping, who received the formula through her state’s WIC program for low-income families, said she had no idea that powdered formula could contain bacteria that could harm her baby.
She said her family agreed to take legal action to help hold Abbott accountable and raise awareness about the dangers of powdered formula.
“Parents need to know that powdered formula is not sterile,” Ping said. “It just needs to be out there. This needs to be known.”
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Associated Press researcher Rhonda Shafner in New York contributed to this report.
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The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Science and Educational Media Group. AP is solely responsible for all content.
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