228 | When food fraud turns deadly: milk adulteration kills 6 people |
Bonus: mass balance guide with downloadable templates
This is The Rotten Apple, an inside view on food fraud and food safety for professionals, policy-makers and purveyors. Subscribe for insights, latest news and emerging trends straight to your inbox each Monday.
Mass balance for food safety systems
When food fraud turns deadly: milk adulteration kills 6 people
Food safety news and resources roundup
How natural food colours are made
Food fraud news and recent incidents
Wow, last week I learned that the Salmonella strain associated with a recent outbreak linked to moringa powder is resistant to all antibiotics currently used to treat Salmonella infections.
Antimicrobial resistance has been on the radar for years now, but I don’t recall ever hearing of a confirmed foodborne outbreak where the pathogen is resistant to everything (links and sources in this week’s Food Safety Roundup).
Also wow: a very nasty series of deaths in India caught my attention because of their possible links to food fraud. Food fraud-related deaths are thankfully rare, and in this case, the root cause turned out to be quite unexpected.
Welcome to Issue 228, and a huge shoutout to 👏👏 Leira 👏👏 for becoming a paid subscriber and to everyone who renewed their subscription in February. Without your support this wouldn’t be possible. Thank you.
This week, as well as the deadly adulteration story, I’ve got a fantastic new guide to conducting mass balance exercises (+ templates!) for paying subscribers, and a relaxing introduction to natural food colours.
And in this week’s food fraud news: a very disturbing food fraud perpetrated with live sheep.
Thanks for being here,
Karen
P.S. Know someone who would like this newsletter? Please tell them about it and help grow our global food safety community.
Cover image: For illustration only
Mass balance for food safety systems
Mass balance exercises: they’re simple in theory but can be fiddly in practice, with pitfalls for the unwary. Get my exclusive guide to mass balance exercises, plus two downloadable Excel worksheets in this month’s special supplement for paying subscribers.
How to Perform a Mass Balance: Step‑by‑Step Guide + Downloadable Worksheets
This guide walks you through how to perform a clear, defensible mass balance in a food facility, using language and steps that make sense on the factory floor and in an audit.
More resources for you
If you’re new here, every month I create actionable articles, playbooks and resources. Here’s some you might have missed:
When food fraud turns deadly: milk adulteration kills 6 people
At least seven people are in a critical condition, and at least six people have died after consuming contaminated milk in India. The milk is reported to have come from a processing facility, a “private milk chilling unit”, that was operating without the required permissions. The person who operated the unit has been arrested.
The milk was contaminated with toxic ethylene glycol coolant after a leak, according to CNBCTV (India). Propylene glycol, not ethylene glycol, is food-safe and typically used for dairy operations, whereas ethylene glycol is used for non-food industrial applications and in automotive antifreeze.
Propylene glycol is food-safe and typically used for dairy operations, whereas ethylene glycol is used for non-food industrial applications and in automotive antifreeze.
Victims reported tasting an unusual flavour in the milk before they began to experience symptoms of acute poisoning. One media outlet reported the deaths were caused by acute renal failure.
If the allegations published by CNBCTV prove correct (investigations are ongoing), this is a case where a person who perpetrated food fraud – by falsely implying their milk was from a properly licensed operation – has caused multiple deaths.
Important things to know
In India, the word ‘adulteration’ is used to refer to both accidental contamination events and deliberate addition of undeclared materials to food.
The presence of ethylene glycol in the milk appears to be the result of accidental contamination, not intentional adulteration. The unlicensed milk operator would not have wanted to sicken their customers, knowing this would bring unwanted scrutiny.
The food fraud element of this tragic situation is therefore not related to the ‘adulteration’ (contamination) of the milk, but to the deception perpetrated by the milk processor, who was operating “without the required permissions”. A properly licensed operator would not have used the highly toxic industrial coolant ethylene glycol in their refrigeration system.
Suspicious similarities…
This all sounds scarily familiar to me.
In 2023, I wrote about the tragic contamination case(s) that caused 300 deaths of children from contaminated cough syrup in multiple countries, including Gambia, Indonesia and Uzbekistan. The deaths were attributed to the presence of ethylene glycol in the syrup, instead of the inert and safe propylene glycol, which is used as a humectant in medicated syrups.
Indonesian police investigating the cough syrup manufacturer told reporters that a chemical company had misrepresented industrial-grade ethylene glycol and diethylene glycol as pharmaceutical-grade propylene glycol.
The company name and branding of a well-known pharmaceutical supplier were used on the products, presumably without its authorisation. The perpetrators then allegedly supplied the counterfeit and highly toxic ‘Dow Chemical Thailand Pharmaceutical-grade Propylene Glycol’ to local medicine manufacturers via a distributor.
Four men from the medicine manufacturer in Indonesia were jailed, despite their legal representatives blaming the supplier of a contaminated ingredient in the medicine for the deaths, while 21 people who worked in the import, distribution and licensing of imported medicines faced court in Uzbekistan on charges including the sale of substandard medicines, tax evasion, negligence, forgery and bribery.
The Indonesian makers of the fake ‘Propylene Glycol’ and their distributors also faced criminal prosecution. The manufacturer was found at fault for the poisonings in 2024, in a civil case brought by affected families in Indonesia, and ordered to pay compensation to the families of the injured children.
Key learnings
It’s rare for food fraud events to be directly implicated in serious illnesses or deaths. However, people who are willing to cut corners and break food safety laws to make illegal profits - for example, by operating without a licence - put the safety of consumers at risk.
When illnesses and injuries do occur as a result of food fraud, it can lead to the perpetrator getting caught, and this disincentivises obviously unsafe practices by food fraud perpetrators.
In the recent case in India, the illnesses and subsequent traceback resulted in the arrest of the unlicensed operator.
If allegations about the nature of the poisonings in India prove correct, that is, if the milk was contaminated with toxic ethylene glycol coolant - coolant that should never be used in a food context - after a leak in an unlicensed chilling system, this will be a rare case of illegal food processing causing consumer deaths.
Main source:
CNBCTV18 India (2026). Andhra milk adulteration case: Six dead, seven people in critical condition; FSSAI seeks report. [online] Available at: https://www.cnbctv18.com/india/andhra-milk-adulteration-case-six-dead-seven-people-in-critical-condition-fssai-seeks-report-ws-l-19857629.htm
More: 🍏 Issue 75 | Glycol Fraud Leads to Deadly Consequences | The Rotten Apple 🍏
Quick Bites: Food Safety News
Our food safety news and resources roundups are expertly curated (by me 😎), to include only the most interesting and valuable news, guidance and webinars from around the world: no fluff, no filler, no junk, only information I believe will be genuinely useful to food safety professionals.
This week: The Salmonella strain associated with an outbreak linked to moringa powder is resistant to all antibiotics used to treat Salmonella infections.
Click the preview box below to view.
How natural food colours are made
Suspicious cover image notwithstanding, I found this video about natural food dyes surprisingly watchable and informative. (And it’s totally safe for work).
Below for paying subscribers: Food fraud news and incident reports
📌 Food Fraud News 📌
In this week’s food fraud news:
📌 Help for cocoa and chocolate traders
📌 Bizarre (and disturbing) food fraud with live sheep
📌 Fake peppercorns
📌 Coconut fibres used to adulterate powdered teas (+ more)