No apology for Cork mum who found fly in baby food
The woman, who asked not to be identified, said she discovered the fly after pouring her baby’s Cow & Gate breakfast into a bowl.
“I poured the cereal into the bowl and saw a darker part, but at first I thought it was just part of the product. Then after a closer look I discovered it was a fly,” she said.
She immediately contacted Cow & Gate and in response got a phone call asking her to send the product and fly to them.
“I called the HSE environmental health office and they advised me not to. They told me to bring it into them for further investigation,” she said.
According to the HSE’s public analyst, a phosphatase test proved that the fly had been dry heated, meaning it had gone through the same system that the porridge had.
In a letter to the woman, the analyst states that, in his opinion, the presence of the fly in the product “renders the food unfit for public consumption”.
“The HSE proceeded to get in touch with Cow & Gate, but in the meantime I had heard nothing. Weeks went on and I still had not had any contact from them,” she added.
“I got in touch with them eventually and they asked for the fly and the remainder of the porridge again. The HSE advised me to keep it in their lab and offered that the company could go and examine it there, but they did not.”
The woman said she feels let down that the company offered no apology and made no effort to admit what had happened or reassure her steps were being taken to ensure it did not happen again.
She was offered a box of food products by the company, which she refused.
A spokesperson for Cow & Gate said it was difficult to see how such a thing would happen as there is a raft of strict measures in place to ensure nothing like this can get through the system.
“Our quality assurance team have said they are positive this could not get through the system. The product is rolled and sieved through a rigorous process and would have been packed and sealed three months prior to it being opened,” she said.
“We treat all complaints very seriously. In this case we got back to the woman and asked her to send back the product as we wanted to look into it, but she did not.
“We have not had a chance to look at the findings of the public analyst and have not been able to test the product ourselves,” said the spokesperson.
“I am not casting doubt on the findings, but it would have helped if we could have had a look too.
“Nor am I casting doubt on what the customer is saying. We did our best to look into things and very much regret that the customer feels we did not.”
