FDA Warns Of Honey Pacifiers
1,164 total views, 1 views today
A reminder to parents: Don’t be feeding honey to babies.
The FDA recently sent a safety alert reminding parents to avoid feeding children under a year old honey. This also applies to honey on pacifiers as well.
This safety alert was issued after Texas Health Services warned parents of the same thing due to the four cases they had that got four infants hospitalized. What got the children hospitalized was a case of botulism which was contracted via pacifiers that contained honey. The pacifiers in question came from Mexico, however there were similar items to these available all throughout the US on a retail level and in online stores.
For those who aren’t familiar with botulism that’s alright. It’s a pretty rare disease. That doesn’t take away from the fact that it is incredibly dangerous and has the potential to be fatal to infants. Botulism occurs when a child is exposed to botulinum toxins and can cause a people to have trouble with breathing, speaking, and swallowing. Some other clear signs of botulism is facial weakness and paralysis.
That being said, infants that are under a year old express some different symptoms. Some of these symptoms can be things like constipation but can include poor feeding or weak sucking. Some other signs include difficulty breathing but also loss of head control. These findings were reported by the Texas health department.
Honey as we all know isn’t harmful to us, that is unless we are younger than a year. In the case of infants its clearly deadly as there is plenty of research showing that honey is linked to botulism within infants under a year older.
With this in mind, the FDA urges both parents and caregivers alike to avoid dipping pacifiers in honey or buying pacifiers with honey in them and giving them to infants under a year. The FDA has also made a call to online retailers who are selling related baby products to discontinue them immediately. The FDA is also working to identify retailers who carry these products while companies begin the removal process. They will be posting those companies on their Twitter page.
“If you purchased a pacifier that’s filled with honey, stop using it and discard it immediately,” the FDA wrote on Twitter.