Contaminated milk scare spreads

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MILK and other dairy products were removed from shop shelves across China after milk from the country's top three dairy brands tested positive for melamine - the banned substance that has killed four babies and sickened thousands of other infants.

The coffee chain Starbucks has ordered its 300 branches in China to immediately switch to soy milk, while the fast food giant KFC revealed that it, too, had used milk from suspect suppliers.

China's quality watchdog, in a report posted yesterday on its website, said that 24 batches of milk from Yili, Mengniu and Guangming - top brands trusted by hundreds of millions of Chinese - contained up to 8.4 micrograms of melamine per kilogram. The tolerable daily intake for melamine is 0.63 micrograms per kilogram of body weight, putting children most at risk.

The Chinese public had previously been encouraged by the Government to increase dairy consumption for health and economic reasons.

The watchdog said 90 per cent of China's liquid milk was safe but that almost 10 per cent of samples from Mengniu Dairy and Yili Industrial Group were tainted. Milk from Shanghai-based Guangming was also contaminated.

The General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine downplayed the health risk, saying an adult would have to drink two litres of the worst-contaminated milk before it caused problems.

The sweeping recall came as the World Health Organisation's representative in China told the Herald the full extent of the crisis was still unravelling and the WHO was trying to find out why it took so long for the public to be told.

The health scare erupted after the state-owned Sanlu Group last week recalled its infant baby milk powder after revealing that it contained melamine. A subsequent government investigation found that baby formula from a fifth of China's 109 dairy producers was also contaminated, though in far lower levels. However, Sanlu had received complaints as early as March from parents about babies falling ill, and the company knew from August 2 that its products were tainted.

It did not go public until September 11, after its New Zealand shareholder, Fonterra, told the New Zealand Government. The New Zealand Government leapfrogged provincial officials and informed Beijing directly.

Four infants have died and more than 6200 others have been sickened. About 1300 babies remain hospitalised, with 158 suffering from acute kidney failure.

"We do not yet know the full extent of the issue," Dr Hans Troedsson, WHO's representative in China, told the Herald yesterday. He said the agency was concerned about exports of tainted products.

"The ongoing investigation will hopefully review where the problems were, and why it took so long for the public to be informed," Dr Troedsson said.

"WHO is working closely with [the] Chinese responsible authorities to ensure any further information on import/export of tainted products will be shared in a timely manner."

Hong Kong ordered the recall of all dairy products from the Inner Mongolia dairy giant Yili Industrial Group, after tests found melamine in eight of the company's 30 products, including ice-cream, yoghurt and milk.

Starbucks stores yesterday switched to imported soymilk. A company representative told the Herald it was still looking into alternatives, although it did not think its milk was contaminated.
Rice scandal claims minister

TOKYO: Japan's farm minister has resigned amid a food scare involving pesticide-laced rice that caused the recall of thousands of products across the country and led a company executive to commit suicide.

Seiichi Ota gave his resignation to the Prime Minister, Yasuo Fukuda, yesterday, just days before the ruling Liberal Democratic Party was due to elect a new prime minister who may call snap general elections.

His resignation is the latest development in a scandal that began when a rice miller was found to have sold contaminated rice for human consumption to boost profits.

Mikasa Foods in Osaka admitted earlier this month that it had sold about 400 tonnes of inedible rice - intended for use as fertiliser, animal feed and glue - as more expensive grain to hundreds of companies across Japan.

The rice was later used to make sake and shochu, a distilled spirit, and rice crackers. One of Mikasa Food's clients later supplied several hundred kilograms of the toxic rice to more than 100 hospitals, homes for the elderly and at least one school.

Health experts said rice containing the pesticide, methamidophos, would have to be eaten in large quantities to pose a risk to health.

The scandal took a macabre turn this week when Shuichi Nakagawa, 54, the president of a company that had bought the rice, committed suicide.

Agence France-Presse, Guardian News & Media