The father of an Ohio teen who died in 2014 after ingesting a powdered caffeine marketed as a dietary supplement has filed a lawsuit against Amazon.com and the product’s distributors, claiming that they failed to provide proper warnings about the dangers of using the substance.
When the 18-year-old died, the amount of caffeine in his system was about 23 times greater than the level in a typical soda or coffee drinker, and a coroner ruled that his death was due to cardiac arrhythmia and seizure due to acute caffeine toxicity.
Since then, the Food and Drug Administration has warned people against ingesting pure caffeine, saying that a single teaspoon of the stuff is equivalent to 25 cups of coffee. Even then, it “is nearly impossible to accurately measure powdered pure caffeine with common kitchen measuring tools and you can easily consume a lethal amount,” the FDA cautioned last summer.
The lawsuit filed today lists defendants as a classmate who gave the teen the powder, reports the Associated Press; Amazon for shipping the powder to the classmate and six companies in Arizona that the father’s lawyer says packaged and sold the powder under the name Hard Rhino. He says it appears the companies are related.
According to the lawsuit, the package label informs users that a cup of coffee has about 1/32nd of a teaspoon of a caffeine, but though it also warns that the powder “can be dangerous if abused,” and “failure to follow safety guidelines can result in serious injury or death,” it lacks specific instructions on proper use.
The thought being, if you don’t know how much you are supposed to take, how do you know if you’re abusing it or are in danger?
“The difference between life and death is a pinch and a smidgen,” the attorney says, adding that Amazon has a team of compliance specialists that is supposed to review products before they can be sold on the site.
The father’s attorney says that despite the fact that Hard Rhino stopped selling the powder in light of the FDA’s warning, he was able to order the product from another company off the Internet recently.
“It’s still out there,” he said.
Amazon declined to comment to the AP, and the six companies in Arizona didn’t respond to messages.
Father of Ohio teen poisoned by caffeine powder files suit [Associated Press]
by Mary Beth Quirk via Consumerist
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