Yesterday's ban on Chinese made tooth paste in the US is yet another to the list of tainted food materials being discovered over the past few weeks.
A poison used in anti-freeze and brake fluids was found in toothpaste. FDA has asked consumers not to use Chinese made toothpaste and has withdrawn the toothpaste from the market. US estimatedly brought $3.3 Million worth of tooth paste last year.
Last month the market was flooded with the withdrawal of pet foods after a banned chemical was found in the pet food. This seems to have come thr' the use of melamine in the protien supplement. This also started a scare as similar protien glutamates are supposedly used in the cereal bars too.
Even though these are the one's that made news and might bring a lot of companies into legal pursuits, the list does'nt end here. There were 107 food imports from China that was detained by the FDA, along with over a 1000 shipments of chinese dietary supplements, toxic Chinese cosmetics and counterfiet chinese medicines.
This includes
Dried apples preserved with a cancer-causing chemical
Frzen catfish laden with banned antibiotics
scallops and sardines with petrefying bacteria
Mushrooms laced with illegal pesticides
With the chinese imports in the food sector crossing $7 billion this year, this raising a big concern. Even though the senate went to the extreme of considering banning all food imports from China, the lure of the cheap imports is too much for the US capitalistic market. The FDA is negotiating with Chinese diplomats to add more stringent tests and regulations on the imports. They want to impose more tests in the shop floor so as to avoid huge contaminations.
What would this mean to the consumers? Would the food items be more expensive just because it needs to go thr' all these tests? Should we go more organic?
But in the interim, should I resist the chinese take out!!!
The world is a dangerous place, not because of those who do evil, but because of those who look on and do nothing.
- Albert Einstein
