Parents urged to keep Kinder eggs from their kids on Easter Sunday

So far in Ireland, there have been 15 confirmed cases of Salmonella from Kinder eggs and most of them involved young children. File photo

Parents are being urgently reminded not to let their children eat any Kinder eggs that they may receive tomorrow due to the significant risk of Salmonella infection.

With less than 24 hours to go until hundreds of thousands of children are cracking into their Easter egg haul, Dr Paul McKeown, a consultant in public medicine with the Health Protection Surveillance Centre, said the “timing is terrible” for such products to face a recall.

However, he told the Irish Examiner that people have to be aware of the risks. The Food Safety Authority of Ireland first issued a notice about the recall of Kinder products linked to a Salmonella outbreak on April 2. 

The outbreak has hit a number of European countries, and authorities have linked it to a factory from manufacturers Ferrero, based in Belgium. So far in Ireland, there have been 15 confirmed cases and most of them involved young children.

“Just shy of 50% of cases were admitted to hospital which is higher than we’d expect,” Dr McKeown said. “We know from this outbreak that more than three-quarters of the cases were little girls and the great majority of cases under the age of 10. It’s hardly surprising given these products are geared towards young children.” 

He said food recalls are very good at removing products from shelves. “But they’re not as good at removing products that have already been bought, as people might not have seen the news or they’re busy or so on," he added.

"Our concern is that these products may have been bought by parents, grandparents, godparents, uncles, cousins and the like and could have been hidden away until this weekend as the Easter Bunny tends to do.” 

People have been warned to avoid a number of Kinder products, regardless of their best before dates, including: 

• the standard 20g Kinder Surprise; 
• a three-pack of Kinder Surprise;
• Kinder Mini Eggs;
• Kinder Egg Hunt Kit;
• the 100g Kinder Surprise and;
• all pack sizes of Kinder Schokobons.

While Ireland has the capability of tracking the specific strain of Salmonella linked to this outbreak, the public health consultant warned that there may have been more cases where people did not come forward for treatment.

Dr McKeown added that the illness which can arise from consuming these products can be “very distressing for children”, with symptoms such as bloody diarrhoea.

People infected with Salmonella typically develop symptoms between 12 and 36 hours after infection. Other symptoms may include fever, headache and abdominal cramps.

“What we don’t want to do is see children getting sick, and parents or grandparents feeling guilt afterwards for giving them what they thought was a treat," said Dr McKeown.

"Given that we’re at Easter, the clear message is to check once again and see if you have any of those products that are on that list published by the FSAI. And please don’t eat them.”