The Supreme Council of Health (SCH) has reassured the public that all stocks of the powdered infant formula Similac available in the local market are safe for consumption.
Tests conducted at the Central Food Laboratory under the SCH on Similac samples have proved that no tainted batches of the popular milk product were being sold in Qatar, the SCH said yesterday.
Samples from all consignments of Similac arriving in Qatar had been sent for laboratory tests, following recent reports from the US and some other countries that some batches of Similac were found to be containing beetles and their larvae.
Wassan Al Baker, director of Food, Safety and Environmental Health at the Public Health Department of the SCH, said laboratory tests had shown that the batches available in Qatar were free from such contaminants and safe for consumption.
Abbott Laboratories, the manufacturer of Similac, had announced a voluntary recall of about five million units but limited the recall to the US, Puerto Rico, Guam and countries in the Caribbean.
The SCH said that the Similac products in the local market were coming from Ireland. Qatar is not importing Similac products from any of the countries where the tainted batches had been found.
On September 26, the SCH had issued a circular to all food inspectors asking them to collect samples from all consignments of Similac for laboratory tests.
A senior official of the manufacturing company representing the Gulf and North Africa region had sent a letter to the SCH informing that the product recall had nothing to do with the batches available in the markets in the Gulf region.
THE PENINSULA