Do not eat raw Nestle Toll House refrigerated cookie dough, two federal agencies are warning. Both the Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention say that the premade dough could be contaminated with the bacterium E. coli 0157:H7, which causes abdominal cramping, vomiting and diarrhea. Children and older folks can experience even worse symptoms, the agencies say. As a precaution, Nestle is recalling some 300,000 cases of the dough after reports of food-borne illness in 28 states. “While the E. coli strain implicated in this investigation has not been detected in our product, the health and safety of our consumers is paramount, so we are initiating this voluntary recall.”  Nestle spokeswoman Laurie MacDonald said, “The health and safety of our consumers is our No. 1 priority. We felt the best thing to do is a voluntary recall.” Nestle immediately took action after being notified by the FDA on Wednesday, she said. “We really want to remind consumers that raw cookie dough should not be eaten,” she said. More than 60 people have become sick in 28 states after eating raw cookie dough. Twenty-five people were hospitalized. No one has died.

We’re Not Out of the Woods Yet with Swine Flu

Swine flu may have fallen off the front pages in recent days, but federal and state health officials say that the illness is spreading so quickly that it’s hard to keep count of the victims. In the past week alone, they say, the swine flu has accounted for about 40 percent of the flu viruses diagnosed in the United States. Read more

The vicious new strain of swine flu continued its rampage across the United States, taking its first U.S. life, that of a toddler from Texas. The 2-year-old is the first American and first person outside of Mexico to die. “A child has died from the H1N1 virus,” Dr. Richard Besser, the acting director of the Centers for Disease Control, told CNN Wednesday. “As a parent and a pediatrician, my heart goes out to the family.” Read the rest.