Fact Check

Maggots Found in Huggies Diapers?

Did a woman find an infestation of maggots inside a package of Huggies brand diapers?

Published Oct. 17, 2014

Claim:

Claim:   Maggots found living inside a package of Huggies brand diapers.


UNDETERMINED


Examples:


[Collected via Facebook, October 2014]

Is there any truth to the rumor going round of maggots or worms in some diaper packs? Sounds like a hoax to me but I want to be sure.


 

Origins:   On 16 October 2014, images purportedly showing maggots living inside a Huggies brand diaper went viral on Facebook. The images were initially posted to the official Huggies Facebook page by Jessica Kraynak:



WARNING FOR THOSE WITH CHILDREN WHO BUY HUGGIES!!!

I may SERIOUSLY reconsider before buying your next pack. Emma is potty trained during the day, thank god so we only use them at night. Well this morning she took her diaper off and I grabbed it to throw it away and noticed something moving. Yes, MOVING, on the INSIDE OF HER DIAPER. We are now 6 diapers in, so shes been using them for a week. Anyways, I started to look outside where she was just playing to see where it could have come from, nothing outside. So after taking to Google and seeing a previous issue regarding worms, I checked her package and sure enough, they were all throughout them! LIVE, LIVING, WORM TYPE MAGGOT THINGS. We now have an appointment with her Dr. Just wanted to warm my fellow mommies to check or reconsider Huggies. I am absolutely disgusted!!




Huggies has not responded to the accusation despite the photos have been shared thousands of times on Facebook. Its parent company, Kimberly Clark,
did respond to a rumor circulated in November 1999 that a recall had been issued after maggots were found inside a package of Huggies diapers, saying it was very unlikely the larvae had found their way into the diapers while the product was at the manufacturing plant:



Storage pests and insects can enter packaged goods at various points after products leave the manufacturing plant. Despite the many precautions which are taken, insects occasionally enter packaging during shipment or in storage. While this is rare, please be assured that we do our best to determine how these incidents happen so steps can be taken to prevent this in the future. You may be interested to know that our products are not a food source for insects or storage pests, such as meal moth larvae.

To ensure that our manufacturing facilities are protected from insects, Kimberly-Clark has regular inspections by pest control contractors. Further, we have agreements in place with each of our warehouses to ensure that our products are stored in a clean, pest-controlled environment.

You can be confident that the safety of our consumers is of the utmost importance to us and always has been. Thanks again for giving us the opportunity to respond to your concerns.


We as yet don't know if the photographs posted to Facebook on 16 October 2014 by Jessica Kraynak are genuine or, if so, when the maggots pictured found their way into the diaper package. Huggies and parent company Kimberly Clark will eventually have to respond if the rumor persists; until then, all we know is that these are a couple of diapers filled with ewwww.

On 23 October 2014, Bob Brand, the director of external communications for Kimerly-Clark, told us that:


Kimberly-Clark is aware of the situation you describe and we are working directly with the consumer to understand as much as we can about what happened and why.

First and foremost we are very sorry that Jessica and her family experienced this very distressing situation. We have apologized to her directly and will continue to work with her to try and resolve her concerns.

This is a highly unusual complaint for this product. HUGGIES disposable diapers have been used safely by millions of babies for more than 35 years. We take extensive measures at our manufacturing facilities and precautions are taken by those who ship, store and sell our products to prevent this type of occurrence. In the rare instance where this may occur, we take all appropriate steps to investigate and determine the source, whether it occurred while in our control or after it has left our control.

Based on the information provided by the Jessica, the diapers purchased were manufactured in 2013 so we are confident the infestation could not have occurred in the manufacturing process, since maggots couldn’t have survived for that length of time. At this point, our investigation has not been able to pinpoint where or how the problem occurred.


Last updated:   23 October 2014

David Mikkelson founded the site now known as snopes.com back in 1994.