Don’t feel bad if you can’t keep up with all the recalls announced by Johnson & Johnson’s McNeil Consumer Healthcare, we’re having a tough time, too.
 
The latest recall, announced yesterday, pulls from the shelves four lots of Benadryl Allergy Ultratabs and one lot of Extra Strength Tylenol Rapid Release Gels. (How much is a lot? The New York Times reports that it asked McNeil and got no response.)
 
The products were, McNeil says, “inadvertently omitted” from a recall of dozens of products the company announced on January 15. Stay with us here, because that one, in turn, was an expansion of a December 2009 recall.
 
The company says that a chemical used to treat the wood pallets on which the packaging materials were shipped caused a “moldy, musty, or mildew-like odor that, in a small number of cases, was associated with temporary and non-serious gastrointestinal events. These include nausea, stomach pain, vomiting, or diarrhea.”
 
Meanwhile, a House committee is investigating multiple recalls of pediatric over-the-counter meds made by Johnson & Johnson/McNeil.  It’s clear that this is a quality control problem that just won’t quit.