The Consumers’ Foundation yesterday filed a class-action lawsuit against Costco Taiwan on behalf of 135 people who bought the company’s imported berries that were found to have traces of the hepatitis A virus.
The foundation said in a statement that it was asking Costco to pay affected consumers a total of NT$11.07 million (US$341,466), or an average of NT$82,000 per consumer, in compensation for not taking precautionary measures in line with the Act Governing Food Safety and Sanitation (食品安全衛生管理法).
When Costco was first informed in March that consumers in the US had tested positive for hepatitis A, likely due to eating the store’s frozen berries, it did not actively inspect its inventory of the product or recall the berries as a precaution, the foundation said.
Photo courtesy of the Consumers’ Foundation
Instead, Costco only removed the products from its shelves at the end of April after the Food and Drug Administration ordered local public health agencies to monitor the company, it said.
On April 10, the imported berries had tested positive for the virus in Taiwan during a border inspection and Costco Taiwan received word of the positive test the same day, but no action was taken, the foundation said.
The foundation said companies should take responsibility when incidents happen by proactively recalling their products and providing compensation to affected consumers.
It did not say if any of the 135 consumers in the lawsuit had contracted hepatitis A after eating the berries.
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