Nestle said on Tuesday it is recalling certain batches of its core infant nutrition products, including SMA, BEBA and NAN infant and follow-on formulas, sold across Europe after identifying a possible contamination with a toxin that can trigger nausea and vomiting. The recall, which initially began on a limited scale in December, adds pressure on newly appointed Nestlé CEO Philipp Navratil as he works to revive growth through a portfolio review following months of leadership disruption.

The food giant, best known for brands such as KitKat and Nescafé, stated late on Monday that there have been no confirmed cases of illness or reported symptoms linked to any of the recalled formula products.

After a quality concern was flagged in an ingredient supplied by a major vendor, “Nestlé carried out testing on all arachidonic acid oil and related oil blends used in the manufacture of potentially affected infant nutrition products,” a company spokesperson said, according to Reuters.

Nestle Recalls Infant Formula Products Over Toxin Fears

Nestlé has initiated a precautionary, large-scale recall covering a wide range of SMA infant formula and follow-on milk products sold in the UK after detecting a possible risk linked to the cereulide toxin.

The voluntary recall spans several SMA product ranges, pack sizes and batch codes. Affected products include SMA Advanced First Infant Milk, SMA Advanced Follow-On Milk, SMA Anti Reflux, SMA Alfamino, SMA Comfort, SMA Lactose Free and various SMA First Infant Milk options, including both powdered and ready-to-feed formats.

According to Nestlé, the recall was triggered after internal checks pointed to a potential presence of cereulide, a toxin produced by certain strains of the bacterium Bacillus cereus. The toxin is known for being extremely heat resistant and cannot be neutralised through boiling or normal formula preparation, which makes any impacted product unsafe for consumption.

What Is Cereulide?

As outlined by the National Institute of Health, cereulide is a powerful, heat-stable toxin created by some strains of the common bacterium Bacillus cereus. It causes a severe and fast-acting form of food poisoning, known as the emetic type, marked by intense vomiting. The toxin is a cyclic depsipeptide that disrupts mitochondrial function by allowing potassium ions to pass freely. It is especially concerning because it can survive cooking and reheating, and is commonly associated with foods such as rice, pasta and dairy products left at room temperature.

Nestle Recalls Infant Formula: What Happens When You Ingest Cereulide?

If cereulide is consumed, symptoms can appear quickly and may include nausea, vomiting and stomach cramps. Parents and caregivers are being advised to stop using any of the affected products straight away, even if their baby has not shown any signs of illness.

Nestlé has also advised that when infant formula has been prescribed by a healthcare professional, parents should consult a pharmacist, doctor or another qualified medical professional before switching to an alternative. Anyone who has already fed the recalled formula to their child and is worried about possible health effects is urged to seek medical advice.

The company reiterated that it has not received any confirmed reports of illness linked to the recalled batches. However, it said the recall was carried out as a precautionary measure and in line with its internal safety and quality standards.

Nestle Recalls Infant Formula: What Products Are Being Recalled?

A complete list of recalled products and batch codes is available below.

UK:

SMA Advanced First Infant Milk 800g

• 51450742F1
• 52319722BA
• 52819722AA

SMA Advanced Follow-on Milk 800g

• 51240742F2
• 51890742F2
• 52879722AA

SMA First Infant Milk 800g

• 51170346AA
• 51170346AB
• 51340346AB
• 51580346AA
• 51590346AA
• 52760346AB
• 52760346AD
• 52780346AA

SMA First Infant Milk 400g

• 51350346AA
• 52750346AD

SMA First Infant Milk 1.2Kg

• 51340346BE
• 52740346BA
• 52750346BA

SMA LITTLE STEPS First Infant Milk 800g

• 51220346AD
• 51540346AC
• 52740346AD

SMA Comfort 800g

• 52620742F3
• 51240742F3
• 51439722BA
• 51479722BA
• 51769722BA
• 52049722AA

SMA First Infant Milk 200ml

• 52860295M
• 52870295M
• 53220295M
• 53230295M
• 52870295M
• 53030295M
• 53040295M
• 53070295M
• 53080295M

SMA First Infant Milk 70ml

• 53170742B1

SMA Lactose Free 400g

• 51150346AB
• 51500346AB
• 51719722BA
• 51759722BA
• 51829722BA
• 51979722BA
• 52109722BA
• 53299722BA
• 53459722BA

SMA Anti Reflux 800g

• 51570742F3
• 52099722BA
• 52099722BB
• 52739722BA

ALFAMINO 400g

• 51200017Y3
• 51210017Y1
• 51220017Y1
• 51250017Y1
• 51390017Y1
• 51420017Y2
• 51430017Y1
• 51460017Y1
• 51690017Y2
• 51690017Y3
• 51700017Y1
• 51710017Y1
• 51740017Y1
• 52760017Y5
• 52790017Y1
• 52860017Y1
• 53100017Y3
• 53110017Y1
• 53140017Y1
• 53140017Y2
• 53150017Y1

In addition, the following batches may also be available in Northern Ireland:

SMA First Infant Milk 800g

• 51590346AB
• 52750346AE

Ireland:

SMA Advanced First Infant Milk 800g

• 51450742F1

SMA Advanced Follow-on Milk 800g

• 51240742F2

• 51890742F2

SMA Comfort 800g

• 52620742F3

SMA First Infant Milk 200ml

• 53070295M

• 52860295M

• 52870295M

• 53220295M

• 53230295M

SMA First Infant Milk 800g

• 51590346AB

• 52750346AE

SMA GOLD PREM 2 800g

• 53090742F2

SMA LITTLE STEPS First Infant Milk 800g

• 51540346AD

SMA Alfamino 400g

• 51200017Y3

• 51210017Y1

• 51250017Y1

• 51460017Y1

• 51710017Y1

Parents and carers who have been prescribed any of the listed batches are advised to dispose of the product and speak to their healthcare professional for guidance on a suitable alternative.

In a recent episode of Soha Ali Khan’s YouTube podcast 'All About Her', actor Genelia D'Souza told viewers that she does not feed her children ghee over fears of blocking their arteries and causing heart damage.

She told Khan, "Ghee was never a very big part of my diet. I’ve always been more conscious because cholesterol issues run in my family. Whether it was non-vegetarian food or anything else, it was always on my mind, I didn’t want to go overboard.

"We start building habits early. You can't keep feeding children excessive amounts of certain foods and then expect them to suddenly not be overweight and head to the gym later in life. It has to make sense."

The 38-year-old mother-of-two soon clarified that she considers ghee to be a problem when consumed in excess. D'Souza, who follows a strict plant-based lifestyle, explained that ghee, a known superfood, stays far away from her diet and instead she prefers to consume sesame seeds (til) for similar benefits.

She also addressed questions about giving up ghee and butter, stating, "I enjoyed a little bit of ghee and butter, but only in tiny portions. So when I eventually gave it up, it wasn’t a big deal," while acknowledging the sensory appeal of ghee, "I know it’s very tasty and it smells amazing."

Is Ghee Indeed Bad For You?

Made from cow milk butter, ghee contains about 130 calories and 15 grams of fat on average. It is also known to be rich in Vitamin A, D, K and E as well antioxidants.

However due to its high saturated fat content, some experts claim ghee can raise bad cholesterol levels in some people. While saturated fats help control high cholesterol and promote good heart health only apply when it is consumed in moderation. Ghee consumed in excess is indeed unhealthy.

However, it also contains beneficial fats (like omega-3s & CLA) and fat-soluble vitamins, offering potential anti-inflammatory benefits in small amounts, making it a balanced choice for many when balanced with overall diet and lifestyle.

A 1999 Indian Journal of Dairy & Biosciences study also noted that when researchers studied Indian men in a rural population who ate high amounts of ghee, they showed a significantly lower prevalence of coronary heart disease.

High doses of medicated ghee decreased serum cholesterol, triglycerides, phospholipids, and cholesterol levels in those suffering from psoriasis, a chronic autoimmune skin condition causing rapid skin cell buildup, leading to red, scaly, itchy patches, often on scalp, elbows, knees and back.

Who Should Avoid Ghee?

Experts recommend those suffering from conditions such as heart, digestive and kidney issues as well as obesity to steer clear from the superfood. Cholesterol patients should also avoid ghee as it is rich in fatty acids that may increase blood pressure and increase the risk of heart disease.

Lastly, those suffering from jaundice should also avoid it as it can cause major problems for the liver. Doctors suggest consuming not more than two teaspoons of ghee every day as it may pose certain health risks.

Researchers at Stanford University have developed a new AI model which can predict more than 100 health conditions including cancer, mental health, cardiovascular issues and death using sleep study data.

SleepFM uses polysomnography, a comprehensive sleep assessment that utilizes various sensors to record brain activity, heart activity, respiratory signals, leg movements, eye movements and more to provide an accurate prediction of future disease risk, according to the study published in Nature on January 6.

Emmanuel Mignot, Craig Reynolds Professor in Sleep Medicine and co-senior author of the study, said, "We record an amazing number of signals when we study sleep. It’s a kind of general physiology that we study for eight hours in a subject who’s completely captive. It’s very data rich."

It remains unclear when SleepFM will be commercially available to the public and whether it will be incorporated into wearable technology such as watches and phones.

How Does It Work?

The AI model has been trained on nearly 600,000 hours of sleep data collected from 65,000 participants which had been split into five-second increments to combine multiple body signals, such as brain activity, heart activity, muscle activity, pulse and breathing and understand how they relate to each other.

James Zou, PhD, associate professor of biomedical data science and co-senior author of the study commented, "One of the technical advances that we made in this work is to figure out how to harmonize all these different data modalities so they can come together to learn the same language."

After being trained to identify and link different body signals, SleepFM was taught how to understand standard sleep analysis tasks such as different stages of sleep and diagnosing the severity of sleep apnea, a serious sleep disorder where breathing repeatedly stops and starts often due to airway blockage or the brain failing to signal muscles.

Once the model was seen successfully identifying sleep-related issues, it was paired with the sleep recordings and health data of 35,000 patients collected over 25 years for it to learn how to identify chronic diseases through nighttime body signals.

Which Diseases Can It Accurately Predict?

Particularly, SleepFM excelled at predicting Parkinson’s disease, dementia, hypertensive heart disease, heart attack, prostate cancer, breast cancer and death.

“We were pleasantly surprised that for a pretty diverse set of conditions, the model is able to make informative predictions,” Zou said.

Even though heart signals were prominently used to predict heart disease and brain signals were predominant in mental health predictions, the researchers noted that it was the combination of all the data modalities that achieved the most accurate predictions.

“The most information we got for predicting disease was by contrasting the different channels. Body constituents that were out of sync. A brain that looks asleep but a heart that looks awake, for example, seemed to spell trouble,” Mignot said.

Zhou added, "From an AI perspective, sleep is relatively understudied. There’s a lot of other AI work that’s looking at pathology or cardiology, but relatively little looking at sleep, despite sleep being such an important part of life.

"SleepFM is essentially learning the language of sleep."

A 24-year-old man living with dementia who passed away shortly after Christmas has donated his brain to medical research. Andre Yarham, from Dereham in Norfolk, was only 22 when his family first became concerned. His mother, Samantha Fairbairn, noticed changes in his memory and behaviour, including moments that felt out of character.

After medical consultations, Andre was diagnosed with frontotemporal dementia (FTD), a rare condition linked to an abnormal protein mutation. Speaking to the BBC, Ms Fairbairn said her son made the decision to donate his brain in the hope that future families might be spared the same pain. “If this helps even one family spend a little more time with someone they love, then it means something,” she said, describing dementia as a “cruel disease.”

UK’s Youngest Dementia Patient Dies At 24, Leaves Brain To Science

Brain scans later showed unusual shrinkage, prompting a referral to Addenbrooke’s Hospital in Cambridge, where doctors confirmed the diagnosis. Ms Fairbairn told the BBC she experienced “so many emotions, anger, grief, and deep sadness for him.” She also stressed that dementia is not limited by age, saying it “doesn’t discriminate,” and adding that Andre was likely among the youngest patients diagnosed in the UK.

As his condition progressed, he moved into a care home in September last year when his needs became too complex for his family. Within weeks, he was using a wheelchair. Andre died on 27 December, and his brain has since been donated to Addenbrooke’s Hospital to support ongoing research.

In the final month of his life, Andre lost the ability to speak and could only make sounds. Even so, his mother said his core self remained. He held on to “his personality, his humour, his laughter, and his smile” until the end, according to The Independent.

Youngest Dementia Sufferer Dies: What Is Frontotemporal Dementia?

Frontotemporal Dementia (FTD) refers to a group of uncommon, progressive brain disorders that cause nerve cell damage in the frontal and temporal lobes. This leads to changes in behaviour, personality, language, and sometimes movement. The condition often begins earlier than Alzheimer’s disease, typically between ages 45 and 65, and may present with symptoms such as impulsivity, emotional withdrawal, socially inappropriate actions, or speech difficulties. Memory loss is not always the earliest sign. There is currently no cure, although treatments can help manage symptoms, according to the Alzheimer’s Association.

FTD is considered rare and most often affects middle-aged adults, but in exceptional cases, it can occur much earlier in life. Unlike Alzheimer’s disease, which usually begins with memory decline, FTD is more likely to start with noticeable changes in behaviour or personality.

Youngest Dementia Sufferer Dies: Symptoms of Frontotemporal Dementia (FTD)

Symptoms of frontotemporal dementia (FTD) commonly include marked changes in personality and behaviour, such as apathy, impulsive actions, loss of empathy, reduced social awareness, repetitive behaviours, and neglect of personal care. Language problems are also common, including trouble finding words, understanding speech, or speaking clearly. Some people develop movement-related symptoms like stiffness, slowed movements, or tremors, as well as changes in eating habits or appetite. These symptoms gradually interfere with relationships and daily life as nerve cells in the frontal and temporal areas of the brain deteriorate, according to the Mayo Clinic.

“Dementia is an incredibly cruel disease, truly cruel,” Andre’s mother said. “I wouldn’t wish it on anyone. With cancer, people can have treatment, they can go into remission, and they can still live meaningful lives. With dementia, there’s nothing like that.”