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Bad Milk in China Is Just the Tip of the Iceberg
Written by Robert Vance on September 18, 2008 – 12:59 pm“Do not drink milk in China,” a friend warned me yesterday. “My auntie, who is a nurse, told me that her hospital is full of children who are sick from drinking Chinese milk.” Fortunately, I am not a big milk drinker but there are thousands of children throughout China and Asia who are victims of this latest episode of Chinese products being contaminated and unfit for consumption. According to a report today from ABCNEWS.net, “more than 6,000 babies are sick, three have died and 150 have serious kidney failure after drinking milk powder that had been deliberately contaminated with melamine, a toxic substance used in plastics.” While it is Chinese company San Lu that is responsible for this latest tragedy, “now 21 other companies have also tested positive for melamine,” according to the report. Other Chinese friends are telling me that it is better to avoid dairy products in China altogether until this mess can be sorted out.
Really, it would be better to simply avoid eating anything in China at all. If more than 20 companies have been caught using melamine in their products, it is highly likely that hundreds if not thousands of other food producers in China are guilty of similar violations; San Lu just happens to be one of the unlucky companies that was found out. These days, I have much more to worry about than just the air that I am breathing in China. Every time I put food in my mouth I soberly realize that I may very well be ingesting chemicals and substances that are very harmful to my body. Nevertheless, I have to eat so all I can do is pray that my body is not being slowly poisoned.
These poor children who have been killed or harmed by these tainted milk products are victims of a ‘get-rich-no-matter-what’ mentality. Life in this developing country is all about making money as fast as possible. Many Chinese companies, knowing well that they can pay off government inspectors (if they even show up to inspect) are willing to do put anything into their products if it means increased sales. In the city where I live, it seems that every other Chinese person that I talk to is a ‘quality control inspector’ but when you ask what exactly it is that they are inspecting or looking for most cannot answer. I am afraid that many QC’s in China are hired to simply make the company or the factory look as if it cares about quality.
Corruption is also a key to this problem of food quality in China. Local government inspectors may show up to test products but many times they barely even step foot inside the factory. Instead, they are treated to expensive lunches and ‘paid off’ if necessary. Fortunately, the Chinese government is making greater strides than ever to fight this rampant corruption and according to friends who work in factories, changes are happening, albeit very slowly.
There really is no quick fix to this problem of food quality within China; there are simply too many factories in China and this problem has been allowed to grow for far too long. The Chinese government is trying to crack down on violators and corrupt inspectors but it simply does not have enough manpower to be effective. If change is going to take place, it will have to be fueled by actions from the international community. Companies in other countries that import products from China need to do the right thing and start saying ‘no’ to Chinese products. After all, money talks in China and if companies here have no where to send their ’shoddy’ foods and goods, perhaps change will happen quicker in China than we expect. There is just one question. Do big Western companies care about people’s lives or do they just care about making money like so many companies in China? Sometimes I wonder.
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I was talking recently with a young Chinese student in America, who really enjoyed spending some of his free time fishing in the many lakes of Michigan and Canada…….When I asked him if Chinese people fished in China’s lakes, and also ate the fish they caught, he said,quite casually, that they did, even though they knew the fish were most probably contaminated with mercury and other pollutants…….’Chinese people don’t care about such things’ he replied.
But Chinese people WILL care, when many more of them start seeing that WE in the WEST,care enough to reject outright, the crappy ,dangerous and insulting goods they habitually send us.
North Americans should also be aware now, that their number one source of food products is China………..
@J.macklby,
The problem is, I am not so sure that WE do care enough to reject products from China. You and I may care but what about the companies that are importing products from China? If they can’t do that anymore where are they still going to be able to get cheap stuff to make huge profits on in the US? That’s the dilemma…
[...] Warning: this milk may be hazardous to your health — It has been a rough week for parents and babies across China. Over 6,000 babies have been affected by the milk scandal and at least four have died. Could this all have been avoided? Click here to read more… [...]
What we have here really, is two scandals, tainted milk, and then deliberate information shutdown by the Chinese government .
Though the first warnings to the Chinese authorities about the tainted milk did indeed come from the international community,[ via New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark]how would the average Chinese citizen know this, when the warnings were deliberately suppressed , so as not to ‘break’ during the Beijing Olympics.?
Obviously the Politburo sees those 6000+ sick Chinese babies as ‘expendable’ ..
THOS RESPONSIBLE FOR POISONING THE BABY MILK OR MILK IN CHINA, OUGHT TO GIVE THE HARSHEST PUNISHMENT KNOWN TO MAN TO THOSE RESPONSIBLE, SUCH AS SKINNING THEM ALIVE WOULD DO JUSTICE; AND, REMINDER TO NEVER HARM THE INNOCENT, ESPECIALLY CHILDREN, R TO BE PROTECTED & TO NEVER BE ABUSED: WHERE IS/WAS QUALITY CONTROL !?