What Really Caused the Baby Formula Shortage

The Daily

The New York Times

News, Daily News

4.5 • 97.8K Ratings

🗓️ 27 May 2022

⏱️ 32 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

A dire lack of baby formula in the United States in the past few weeks has been blamed on production deficiencies such as the small number of manufacturers and an inflexible supply chain. But Christina Jewett, an investigative reporter at The Times, has traced it back further, to deadly bacteria whose detection set off a chain of events that ultimately led to the shortage. Guest: Christina Jewett, an investigative reporter who covers the Food and Drug Administration for The New York Times.

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0:30.2	Okay, so it is Sunday and I am doing a few spot checks at local stores, pharmacies, supermarkets
0:43.0	to see if there's any B-B formula available at these stores and if there isn't available,
0:49.6	how much of it is there.
0:52.4	And I am starting at a Walmart in Pekips in New York.
0:57.8	Here we go.
1:02.7	And I am going to try to find the baby formula I own.
1:09.2	Frozen pizza, frozen snacks, snack cakes.
1:13.6	Look at this baby.
1:23.2	See baby plates, baby spoons and forks which are adorable.
1:29.0	And here we are.
1:30.3	This is the baby formula department or at least it used to be.
1:33.7	It is completely barren.
1:36.1	We've got just a stack of shelves, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, completely empty.
1:46.3	Nothing.
	...

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