Popular baby food urgently recalled over potentially 'life-threatening' risk
Ella Scott
Featured Image Credit: Karl Tapales/Getty Images
European parents are being urged to check their cupboards after authorities confirmed contaminated baby food pots had been on the market.
HiPP is a beloved German-based company that sells organic baby food and formula milks in major UK retailers, including Waitrose, Tesco, and Sainsbury’s.
The family-run business, dedicated to ‘nurturing a brighter, more sustainable future’, has reportedly become embroiled in a poisoning scandal, with Austrian police confirming a tampered jar was in circulation.
It’s understood that potentially defective items had also been seized in the Czech Republic and Slovakia, with German investigators spearheading the operation.
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On Sunday (19 April), the BBC reported that a customer in the eastern region of Burgenland claimed a jar of HiPP carrot and potato purée they picked up wasn’t right.
Fortunately, the person did not give the item to their child and instead reported it to the police.
Authorities believe at least one more HiPP jar, containing a ‘life-threatening’ dose of rat poison, as confirmed by the Federal Criminal Police Office, is still available.
While officials did not confirm that the cases involved an alleged extortion attempt, the company said in a recall notice that it was related to a ‘criminal act that is being investigated by the authorities’.
HiPP has requested that customers remain vigilant and that baby food jars be removed from shelves at Spar Austria, of which there are more than 1,500 across the country.
The business has also asked customers not to consume HiPP jars purchased at Eurospar, Interspar and Maximarkt, and to return them for a refund.
Police stressed that baby food sold in other shops remained unaffected by the recall. HiPP’s baby formula is also not included in the recall.
In a statement, HiPP said sample items left its factory in ‘perfect condition’ and that the recall is ‘not due to a product or quality defect’.
“The recall is related to a criminal act that is being investigated by the authorities. As part of ongoing criminal investigations, isolated cases of tampered HiPP baby food jars have been seized - as previously reported in Austria, now also in the Czech Republic and Slovakia.
“The responsible authorities determined upon examination of these jars that they contained rat poison.”
The BBC reported that retailers in the Czech Republic and Slovakia have also preemptively removed all HiPP baby food jars from sale.
The Austrian Agency for Health and Food Safety said that consumers should check their jars to see if they are damaged, have open lids, missing safety seals, or smell unsual or spoiled.
A white sticker with a red cirlce on the bottom of the glass jar may also indicate that it has been tampered with.
Parents are urged to seek medical advice if their child has consumed the HiPP product and they are showing signs of bleeding, paleness, or extreme lethargy.
This isn’t the first time this year that child-friendly food items have been recalled in 2026.
In January, several companies, including Nestlé, Danone, and Lactalis, put out notices for parents and caregivers to stop using certain baby formulas due to the possible presence of cereulide, a toxin produced by some strains of Bacillus cereus.
Cereulide can cause serious food poisoning symptoms and may make infants lethargic.
The contamination was traced to a single Chinese supplier of ARA (arachidonic acid) oil, leading all three companies to request that potentially-contaminated baby formula be destroyed or returned to the point of purchase.
For a full list of impacted products, see here.