Health authorities widen salmonella warning for Kinder products

The Maltese health authorities have found Kinder chocolate produced in Belgium, where salmonella contamination has been detected, despite the main trader importing the product from Italy

11 April 2022, 3:01pm
by Kurt Sansone

3 min read

Belgian authorities have shut down a Kinder manufacturing plant over possible salmonella contamination

Kinder chocolate from Belgium, possibly contaminated with salmonella, is also sold in Malta despite the main trader importing the brand from Italy, the health authorities said.

In a second warning in less than a week, the authorities said that market surveillance has shown the presence of Belgian-made Kinder chocolate in Malta.

“Following market surveillance, it transpired that although the main trader in Malta imports the brand from the Italian manufacturing plant and not from Belgium where the alleged contamination took place, on the market there is chocolate which is also made in Belgium,” the Environmental Health Directorate said on Monday.

The directorate updated its warning for consumers not to consume the chocolate by widening the variety of products under the Kinder brand.

People infected with salmonella typically develop symptoms between six and 72 hours after infection.

The most common symptom is diarrhoea, which can sometimes be bloody. Other symptoms may include fever, headaches and abdominal cramps. The illness usually lasts four to seven days. Diarrhoea can occasionally be severe enough to require hospital admission.

The chocolate firm Ferrero was forced to extend its recall of Kinder products to include all those manufactured at a site in Belgium after concerns over possible widespread salmonella contamination at the plant.

The prior recall only covered products with best-before dates up to 7 October, 2022. However, it was widened to include all Kinder products manufactured at Ferrero’s Arlon site since June.

Ferrero has apologised and acknowledged “internal failures”.

Belgium's food safety authority, the AFSCA, said the factory was ordered to shut after Ferrero was unable to provide complete information for its investigation.

Belgium's AFSCA-FAVV said that a link had been confirmed between more than a hundred cases of salmonella over several weeks and Ferrero production in southern Belgium. On Wednesday, Europe's health agency had said it was investigating dozens of reported and suspected cases of salmonella linked with eating chocolate in at least nine countries, mostly among children aged under 10.

The Arlon Kinder plant accounts for around 7% of total global volumes of Kinder production, Ferrero said.

For more information on Maltese health authorities' warning visit the website of the Environmental Health Directorate.

Kinder products affected by latest Maltese health authority warning

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