ZHANG:
Food safety expert Michael Hansen says the US Food and Drug Administration should have foreseen China's toxic milk reaching consumers in America. Sarah Matheson reports from New York.
STORY:
Since July, hundreds of thousands of children have become victims of Chinas milk adulteration scandal, putting US authorities on alert.
The melamine-milk scandal has outraged parents in China, causing large-scale protests, bouts of lawsuits and widespread social unrest.
Chinese manufacturers added melamine to infant formula, to make its protein content look higher when a simple test is applied. But melamine, a product normally used in the manufacture of plastic, has no nutritional value and is toxic when mixed with cyanuric acid.
And now, foods and beverages containing melamine-adulterated milk products have been discovered in America.
To protect infants in the US, the Food and Drug Administration has blocked all Chinese milk products, and tested 74 samples of infant formula. Two have come back positive for melamine.
Consumers Union senior staff scientist Michael Hansen says 74 tests are not enough and that the FDA needs to be more thorough.
[Michael Hansen, Consumers Union]:
The action that the FDA has taken is they have tested 1500 food products, but with the infant formula we are very upset there because they are acting as if there is not too much of a problem. And they found two positives out of 74 samples. That is not a particularly low level. And in fact, if you look at Nestles, one out of the four samples from Nestles was positive.
The Chinese infant milk powder is contaminated with the same substance as the Chinese petfood which killed thousands of pets in the US last year. Dr Hansen says US authorities should have been more diligent about other food products from China being adulterated.
[Michael Hansen, Consumers Union]:
And when they tested the pet food, they found that the pet food was contaminated with melamine and cyanuric acid, and what that was traced to was wheat gluten which was added to the pet food. And wheat gluten is the high protein part of wheat and that sells for a lot of money relatively and what they were doing was taking wheat flour and adding melamine to it.
He said the infant formula scandal is just another chapter to the economic adulteration of Chinese food products, and the FDA should be delving deeper.
"One area, they havent really looked at that is very important is dietary supplements, these sports energy drinks or these protein powders. Those can contain milk protein or milk protein substances as well, and they could potentially be positive - so it is a broad range of food products."
He said even food from other countries could contain contaminated products from China.
[Michael Hansen, Consumers Union]:
The FDA has taken some action but there is a problem because they are only focusing on products that come directly from China. Those milk products can actually be shipped to another country, made into something and then sent into the United States. Thats a phenomena called transshipment. And they could be leaking in that way.
At the end of November, about 300,000 children have been victims of Chinas milk adulteration scandal. Six have died from kidney stones and kidney problems, and more than 600 are still hospitalized.
Sarah Matheson, NTD New York.
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Chinese Melamine Found Across the United Statesby NTDTV3,824 views
One major thing I don't understand is ok we see that Hong Kong has 5.9 PPM of Melamine in some of their eggs and that's not even directly transfered, who knows how much is in the whole chicken that makes the egg. So what I want to know is how come we have 1 PPM and below in our foods when there is more coming from China, where does the other 4 PPM go?
FCCAGut 3 years ago
This alone proves that humans arn't the smartest creatures on the Earth...GO MONKEYS!
FCCAGut 3 years ago
so terrible!!!!
peppera69 3 years ago
The responsabils of this need eat her product !!!
telesette 3 years ago
it is terrible what humans can do to get a profit ... they wouldn t care if some children or beloved pets just died !!! The important thing for them is to get profit out of it !!!! very nice !!! And we should be the so called "superior"race... :D
We are the joke of the planet
goldenstarlight 3 years ago
Oh terrible!:(
cercopitecovervet 3 years ago
Thanks to Yourmoment to share with me this information: we are the SNAC association in France,taking care about nutrition pet concerning the dry pet food they are talking in this video. If anyone in Europe feels concerned for pets, please check out on my blog and/or contact me on TVshÄ.
Valérie.
TVSHA 3 years ago
OMG that is horrible I need to tell my cousin!her child is using that
exsportsplexgymnast 3 years ago
A lot of our food comes from Mexico and they import a lot from China. That is what he is trying to explain to you in the video.
Sometimes milk powder can be shipped to Mexico and then to the US and then used by US companies to make products. Those products will be labeled US on the back.
But you're still eating powder from CHINA!
Understand this and wake up America! We are being poisoned and in some cases it is coming from companies right here in the US.
yourmoment 3 years ago