A draft citizen petition would ask the FDA to add the bacteria that cause botulism to the short list of pathogens infant formula makers must test for before their products reach store shelves. Food safety attorney Bill Marler posted the draft and is seeking public comments on the draft until Oct. 30 in an opinion column in Food Safety News, which he founded and publishes. He plans to file it on behalf of 23 parents whose babies developed botulism after drinking powdered formula.
This is advocacy, not a rule. Marler represents each of the 23 families in litigation, which he discloses, and the FDA has not responded because nothing has been filed yet. Twenty-one of the families are from the ByHeart outbreak and two from the Nara Organics outbreak.
