When eight-year-old Nathan Aïech sat down for a Friday night pizza with his father and stepfamily at their home outside Paris, it was their traditional “fun” weekend meal. The family had bought Buitoni frozen pizza, its colourful packaging boasting of two centuries of Italian cuisine. It seemed better than cheaper supermarket options. “A child is always happy when it’s pizza for dinner,” said Yohan Aïech, Nathan’s father.
Nathan was a sporty child, in full health, who wanted to be a high-speed train driver. Two days after the meal he complained of a stomach ache. Within a week, he was fighting for his life in intensive care, with doctors saying his brain, heart and kidneys were compromised. After dialysis, surgery and two heart attacks, Nathan died on 18 February. French health authorities later confirmed that the E coli bacteria infection and complications that killed him could be linked to the Buitoni pizza Fraîch’Up range.
Nathan was the first child to die in what is being called Europe’s biggest food scandal in 30 years. The E coli outbreak that killed two children and left more than a dozen with serious, long-lasting health complications has prompted fear in France’s food industry and panicked consumers.
At the heart of the controversy is Nestlé, one of the world’s biggest food conglomerates, which owns Buitoni as part of its array of brands from KitKat to Nespresso and Häagen-Dazs ice-cream. Nestlé, which has had various controversies in its long history – from the boycott over the marketing of formula milk for babies in developing countries in the 1970s to rows over bottled water extraction in North America – is now facing one of its biggest challenges.
“The pain we feel is indescribable,” Aïech said. “Nathan trusted his parents to feed him. I want Nestlé to explain to us how this happened and what will be put in place so it never happens again.”
A preliminary criminal investigation is under way for involuntary manslaughter, injury and breaches of food safety requirements. Now a group of 48 families, including 55 victims, have filed a €250m (£217m) civil suit for gross negligence against Nestlé France and are pressing to change the law for better controls in the food industry.
In April, the state ordered Nestlé France to suspend production at its Buitoni factory in Caudry, northern France, where the Fraîch’Up pizza range was made. The suspension order highlighted “a deterioration of food hygiene controls” and said inspections had shown the presence of “rodents” and insufficient measures to prevent pests from contaminating a food production site.
Nestlé France announced last month it had tested more than 2,000 samples from its factory and ingredients, and that an E coli contamination of the flour seemed “the most probable” explanation, adding that it found no trace of the bacteria on production lines. The legal investigation led by a judge will have the final word, but could take years. The company has said it will cooperate with authorities and “put in place the necessary measures” so nothing like this happens again.
Pierre Debuisson, a lawyer for the families, called the deaths and illness “an unprecedented human tragedy”. When E coli bacteria infects humans, particularly children, it can cause complications such as hemolytic uremic syndrome, a form of kidney failure. Debuisson said many of the surviving children were treated in intensive care and some suffered permanent organ damage.
“Everyone can identify with this, everyone eats pizza,” he said. “Hundreds of thousands of French people could have found themselves in this situation.”
Debuisson said he wanted answers from the state and Nestlé France on factory cleaning processes and the delay in connecting the E coli outbreak to the pizzas. State agencies informed Nestlé France on 17 March of a possible link and the next day the company recalled almost 1m Fraîch’Up pizzas, stopped deliveries and suspended production. But Debuisson said that for weeks after the first cases of children falling ill in January, the pizzas continued to be eaten. He added that Nestlé had already faced an E coli contamination of cookie dough in the US in 2009 and should have been aware of risks.
The families now want changes to the law to create tougher controls on food production and higher penalties for contamination. Debuisson said the state’s criminal investigation was not progressing fast enough. “The families I represent are appalled, they feel abandoned by the justice system.”
One young couple in Brittany, who sat down to a dinner of Buitoni Fraîch’Up pizza in February, said their lives had been destroyed. Théo Soavi was in the military, and his wife, Ludivine, cared full-time for their son, Kelig, aged two-and-a-half. Kelig had already eaten his dinner but tasted some pizza from his parents’ plates.
“He nibbled tiny pieces beside us, not even a whole slice,” Soavi said. After three weeks in intensive care, including emergency heart surgery, Kelig died on 10 March. “Since then, we feel alone,” Soavi said. “This is a fight for the truth and for Nestlé to recognise its responsibility. We’ve lost everything, we’ve got nothing left to lose.”
Aurélie Micouleau, who lives near Montpellier in the south, said her sons’ lives were changed for ever after they shared a Buitoni Fraîch’Up pizza at the end of February. First her five-year-old son Curtis fell ill and was treated in intensive care, with uncertainty over whether he would survive as complications hit his kidneys and brain. Then his 10-year-old brother, Preston, was rushed to hospital. Both were on kidney dialysis and fighting for their lives. Now they are frail, on medication and facing lifelong health concerns. “We live in constant fear that they will relapse or need a kidney transplant, or of the impact on their brains,” Micouleau said. “We don’t even know their life expectancy now. It will have gone down.”
The boys are often rushed back to hospital. “They wake at night hitting the walls from nightmares,” Micouleau said. “As a parent you think: ‘I gave my child something that poisoned them’ and the feeling of guilt is very difficult. We’re fighting for truth and justice, and to stop food groups behaving as they please because of their billions.”
Nestlé France said it “reiterated its deep compassion for the victims and their families” and had set up a fund for the parents, administered by an independent charity. The company denied reports on France Info radio that factory cleaning time had been reduced in recent years. Nestlé’s Buitoni factory in Caudry could be authorised to reopen as soon as next month, after dismantlement and cleaning, but the Fraîch’Up pizza production line remains suspended.
But the families no longer buy any Nestlé products, from stock cubes to pet food. “I can never trust them again,” Aïech said. “And I will never give them another cent.”
