That stink coming from your medicine cabinet may just be Tylenol, Motrin or Benadryl, according to the latest recall from Johnson & Johnson. The company is recalling 21 additional lots of drugs, including batches of Tylenol, Children’s Tylenol, Benadryl and Motrin. The company says “the risk of adverse medical events is remote.”

The recall is the latest in a series going back to November of last year, related to wooden pallets that contained the chemical 2,4,6-tribromoanisole. According to J&J:

These lots are being added to the list of recalled products as a precautionary measure after a continuing internal review determined that some packaging materials used in the lots had been shipped and stored on the same type of wooden pallet that was tied to the presence of TBA in earlier recalled lots. All lots involved in the recall were produced before the January 15, 2010 recall, after which McNeil stopped accepting shipments of materials from its suppliers on that type of pallet.

Critics say Johnson & Johnson should be providing more specific information, including the number of bottles of pills included in the recall. Scott Wolfson, a spokesman for the Consumer Product Safety Commission said, “We feel it is critically important for recalling companies to include the number of affected units so it gives the consumer a sense of scope, of importance.” However, a spokesperson for the Food & Drug Administration, which oversees pharmaceutical recalls, countered that “sometimes it takes a while to get the actual number from the company.”

McNeil Consumer Healthcare Announces Voluntary Recall of Certain Over-The-Counter (OTC) Products in the United States, Fiji, Guatemala, Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico, Trinidad & Tobago, and Jamaica [Official Announcement]
Recall of Pills Fails to Give Number of Bottles [NYTimes.com]

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