The Laundress Products Bacteria and Injuries Class Action

The Laundress was introduced as a maker of high-end cleaning products, such as detergents, household cleaners, and shampoos. This class action brings suit against The Laundress, LLC and Conopco, Inc., which does business as Unilever Home & Personal Care USA, which are responsible for the products, alleging that the Laundress products were contaminated with a number of different kinds of bacteria.

The class for this action is all consumers who used a Laundress product subject to the recall and were physically injured after using the product during the applicable statute of limitations period. A long list of recalled products can be found at https://www.thelaundressrecall.com/_files/ugd/b51df1_730f72b3535e49cdad3ac8f4c2d895c7.pdf.

The products are intended, the complaint claims, “as a luxurious, fashionable alternative to grocery store cleaning brands” that were originally sold “through high-end retail stores, department stores, boutiques, and through its own website.”

The complaint quotes a December 2022 announcement from the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) as saying that approximately 8 million Laundress products “can contain bacteria, including Burkholderia cepacian complex, Klebsiella aerogenes and multiple different species of Pseudomonas… People with weakened immune systems, external medical devices, and underlying lung conditions who are exposed to the bacteria face a risk of serious infection that may require medical treatment.”

According to the complaint, consumers who use the products can become infected either through the air or by touching surfaces cleaned with the bacteria-infected products. The complaint alleges, “The Laundress has admitted that it was aware of reports of consumers who had reported bacterial infections after using the Laundress products.”

The plaintiff for this class action, Loria Ostenfeld, used the products and, the complaint claims, “suffered physical injuries associated with the effects of exposure to bacteria. [Ostenfeld] experienced difficulty breathing, lung problems, and skin irritation after using Defendants’ Products.”

The complaint contends that if the companies had warned about the contamination of the products, she would not have bought the products, or she “would have been able to identify the cause of her illnesses sooner.”

According to the complaint, the defendants have engaged in deceptive and misleading conduct in their making, marketing, and selling of the products without warning consumers that the products are contaminated with bacteria. Nothing on the packaging or ingredient list, the complaint alleges, identifies that the products may contain Pseudomonas aeruginosa or other kinds of bacteria.

The causes of action include negligence, as well as strict product liability in the areas of design defect and failure to provide adequate warning.

Article Type: Lawsuit
Topic: Consumer
Tags: Contaminated with Harmful Substances, Contamination During Preparation or Use, Deceptive Advertising, Deceptive Labels, Injury