A family railed against health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and his "Make America Healthy Again" movement on MSNBC Wednesday after their 10-year-old nearly died from an E. coli infection after consuming contaminated food.
NBC News revealed last month that 89 people across 15 states were sickened in an E. coli outbreak due to romaine lettuce in November, but the Food and Drug Administration — under the auspices of Kennedy — closed its investigation in February and never disclosed vital information to the public.
“The FDA should still do its job and let the American taxpayers know exactly who's at fault," Colton George's father, Chris George, told MSNBC's Katy Tur. "That way we can know, and the American people can know."
Tur added, “And you can know to be a little bit careful and...other growers can know to be extra careful so they're not put in the same position."
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Tur continued, "You made a point of calling out Make America Healthy Again and I want to understand why it was important for you, Chris, to put Make America Healthy Again, side-by-side with what happened with your son?”
“I mean, I watched the news and I see, you know, stuff with taking food coloring out of cereal, and stuff like that," George said of Kennedy's recent campaign. "I'm sure that is bad for kids, but E. coli is even worse."
"I haven't heard of food dye that I know of injuring anybody. Cereal's been eaten forever. Lettuce gets eaten and consumed every single day. Therefore, you know, it's deadly for old people and kids, and, thankfully, Colton survived this. Like I said, I just think the FDA needs to do its job and come out and tell us who it was, whether there's romaine lettuce still on the shelf or not."
Colton called the experience "very scary,” adding that for "the first three days, they said it was most likely going to be deadly.”
The FDA still has not released the name of the company that produced the contaminated lettuce.
You can watch the full interview below or here.
- YouTube youtu.be
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