Friday, October 3, 2008

Too Late China

In a desperate damage limitation exercise, China has recalled all exported milk powder sold overseas before 14/9. As China continued to move to contain the scandal over tainted milk that has sickened thousands of children, I have only one thing to say, “Too little, too late.”

Reports state that the first case was reported last year, and the Chinese government knew about the tainted baby milk formula about 1 month before the Olympics. Everything was hushed up to protect profits for the companies and the image of image during the Olympics.

Meanwhile, babies got sicker and sicker. Then the first baby died and the scandal exploded. Right now at least four children are dead and 53,000 babies are sickened in mainland China alone due to the greed of the companies.

China’s food safety reputation was never strong to begin with and with this case, whatever was left of it has been destroyed. Countries around the world have announced steps to ban and recall products containing Chinese milk. If anymore of the sick 53,000 babies die…

I can say with some conviction that China can forget about damage limitation because no one is going trust a single word of what they say. What they need to do is overhaul the safety standards in China and have strict enforcement of those standards. Until that happen, forget it. No one will buy any food with ‘Made in China’ on it.

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