Are you a big fan of ice creams? You should be careful next time you eat them. The American government has taken action on the Wells Enterprises company after studying it and finding plastic inside their ice creams!
Some of the products have been taken off the market since this can be dangerous for our health. This doesn’t mean you can’t eat ice creams anymore, but you should know what flavours are involved in this issue and how it affects you.
Plastic in our ice creams!
The FDA (Food and Drug Administration) is in charge of protecting U.S. citizens from unsafe food, drugs, cosmetics, and any consumed product. So, the FDA decided to take action and, after a quality control of the Wells Enterprises company, took a huge amount of their products off the market – over 8,000 buckets of 3 gallons of their most popular brands and flavours.
The result of the quality control was pieces of hard plastic inside the ice creams which is very dangerous for people if they suddenly swallow this plastic, since it can cause cut on mouths and throats, suffocation or damage in the digestive system, among other consequences.
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You might be curious about whether your favorite flavour is on the contaminated ones, so let’s find out. These are some that were withdrawn from the market:
- Rocky Road flavor (UPC: 070640050314)
- Mocha Almond Fudge (UPC: 080640050420)
- Peanut Butter ’N Fudge (UPC: 070640050574)
- Cotton Candy flavor (UPC: 070640600052)
The list is long, but if you have noticed, next to their names appear several numbers which are important to track the different flavors – this is called the UPC (Universal Product Codes).
Contamination levels
According to the FDA, the withdrawal of products from the market depends on the level of contamination and health consequences. The most dangerous is level 1, this means the product can provoke serious health issues and even death.
Next, we have level 2, here the product can still provoke health issues but they will be less critical than in level 1. The last level is level 3, this is when products have low probabilities of damaging us, but there are chances of not matching specific regulations.
The Wells Enterprises case belongs to level 2, so it wasn’t a very dangerous situation but the company decided to take their ice creams off the market so that they wouldn’t have any legal consequences and for the well being of their consumers.
Should you worry about buying ice cream?
Well, not really. As previously mentioned, the plastic was found in buckets of 3 gallons which is not normally bought by families. It is more probable to find them in restaurants, ice cream shops and companies that buy ice creams wholesale. So, you shouldn’t worry about the ice creams in your house, you can keep buying and eating ice cream!
However, if you go to a restaurant and face a similar situation you should report the issue to authorities to make sure this will never happen and the product is taken off the market as soon as possible.
Good news is that the company is not opposed to authorities and they are voluntarily doing what is necessary. Nowadays, food is getting more contaminated with plastic that we can’t even notice, but that’s something out of our hands. So, what we can do as society is to contribute by informing the company or authorities so nobody will consume that contaminated product. If more companies act like Wells Enterprises, there is hope in less chances of this type of situation happening again. Enjoy your ice cream and don’t think about it!
