We Tested 41 Baby Formulas for Harmful Contaminants

We tested 41 types of formula, made by 14 companies, but the U.S. market is almost completely dominated by just a handful of formula manufacturers. About half of all formula bought in the U.S. is bought through the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC), and almost all of that is made by just two companies: Abbott and Mead Johnson. Abbott makes Similac and EleCare, while Mead Johnson makes Enfamil and PurAmino. 

So what these two companies do has an enormous impact on the formula market as a whole—just look at the ripple effect that shutting down one Abbott plant in 2022 had on the entire nation’s formula supply. 

A third company, Perrigo, is responsible for making many familiar store brands—including Costco’s Kirkland Signature, Sam’s Club’s Member’s Mark, Target’s Up&Up, and Walmart’s Parent’s Choice, as well as Dr. Brown’s. 

Together the formula made by these three companies—Abbott, Mead Johnson, and Perrigo—makes up 79 percent of the U.S. market, according to 2022 estimates.

CR sent questions to all the companies about the types of contaminants they test their ingredients and products for, their thresholds for allowed contaminants, and what the companies thought might be the sources of any of the contaminants that we found in our tests. We also reached out to companies producing formulas where we didn’t find contaminants, to try to learn what they were doing right.

Similac and EleCare manufacturer Abbott Nutrition and Enfamil manufacturer Mead Johnson both sent detailed responses to CR’s test results and questions. These companies, which dominate the formula market, have products that appear in every category, from “Top Choices” to “Worse Choices.” Both companies challenged CR’s results and emphasized that heavy metals or chemicals are never intentionally added to their products. They also said trace levels of heavy metals in the food supply are not an issue that is unique to infant formula. 

“Abbott has a multi-step quality process in place for heavy metals to ensure that levels satisfy all relevant regulatory requirements in all countries we serve,” wrote Hakim Bouzamondo, MD, a vice president at Abbott Nutrition, adding that he disagreed with CR’s using California’s extra-conservative metrics to assess risk. 

A Mead Johnson spokesperson described the company’s “stringent testing protocols” and wrote that the company is “committed to providing the highest levels of quality and safety for all our infant formula products as is evidenced by the fact that parents and pediatricians have trusted our infant nutritional products for nearly 120 years.”

Perrigo, which makes Dr. Brown’s formula and many popular store brands we tested, including Kirkland, Parent’s Choice, Member’s Mark, and Up&Up, also told us that it routinely screens its formulas for heavy metals. “These compounds and PFAS are also found in breast milk,” a spokesperson wrote. “Their levels in infant formula are insignificant and well below regulations in the United States and around the world.”

The parent company for Kabrita, a goat-milk-based formula we put in our Worse Choices category because it contained both arsenic and lead in our tests, told CR that the levels we found fall under regulatory limits, and said that it is unique in publishing its heavy metal testing data on its website for every can of formula it sells.

ByHeart, whose formula landed in our Good Choices category, told us that “It is ByHeart’s goal to limit [heavy metals] to the lowest levels reasonably achievable,” which it strives to do through constant testing and careful supplier selection.

Danone, the maker of the Neocate formula in our Good Choices category, said that while the FDA has not yet set safety levels for heavy metals in baby formula, Danone stays within EU guidelines. Danone’s other two formulas in our test, from Happy Baby Organics and Aptamil, are no longer for sale in the U.S. but fell in the Top Choices range based on testing.

Bobbie’s formulas are all in our Top Choices category, including its Baby’s Only Organic brand. Remi Levoff, Bobbie’s director of communications, told CR, “We pride ourselves on being test obsessed,” adding that “not a single batch leaves the facility until it goes through 2,000 quality checkpoints.”

A2, Bubs, and the makers of Earth’s Best, HiPP, Holle, and Kendamil did not respond to CR’s requests for comment.

Just because consuming toxins is to some extent a fact of life does not mean that food manufacturers cannot and should not do better, CR’s food safety experts say—especially manufacturers of a food as crucial to health and development as infant formula.

“Manufacturers should be continuously testing all of their incoming raw ingredients, their processes, their packaging, and their outgoing products for contaminants like these,” says James E. Rogers, PhD, Consumer Reports’ director of product and food safety research and testing. “The fact that some levels in our tests are lower than others—and many are nondetectable—just shows that it is possible to make safer food.”