Melamine Tainted Milk Powder Still Being Stockpiled in China
Filed under: Caution with these Foods, Children Products Recalled, china, China Product Safety, Dangerous Foods, Effects of Melamine, Melamine, Product Recalls, Recall, Recalled Foods, U.S.A and Melamine Scare, What it is?
China was fighting to maintain public confidence in its food safety after a massive stockpile of melamine-tainted milk powder was seized during raids on warehouses in the nation’s biggest city.
The seizures in Chongqing come three years after the 2008 Sanlu milk scandal, in which three babies died and 300,000 others were sickened by melamine-tainted milk in an episode that fatally undermined already fragile public trust in the government’s ability to keep food safe.
The discovery of the tainted milk powder, which was due to be made into pastry and ice-cream, has drawn attention to the inability of China’s government to police China’s vast and fragmented food chain.
In a bid to restore confidence, the city authorities in Chongqing, a municipal area with 35m inhabitants, have announced a 100-day crackdown on food and drug fraud in a mirror-image of a crackdown last year on mafia crime.
On Monday some 7,900 police in Chongqing were reportedly deployed to conduct city-wide raids on 600 premises suspected of producing illegal or fake food and pharmaceuticals.
Cucumbers recalled in nine states
Filed under: e-coli, Product Recalls, Recall, Recalled Foods, Salmonella
A North Carolina vegetable and fruit distributor has recalled cucumbers distributed to nine states, including Illinois and Indiana, after some of the vegetables distributed to Florida were found contaminated with salmonella, according to the company. Only one lot of about 1,600 cartons of cucumbers distributed to wholesalers is affected, with 139 of the cartons distributed in Illinois and 30 distributed in Indiana, according to a news release from L&M Companies, Inc., of Raleigh, N.C., on the U.S. Food and Drug Administration Web site. Because the cucumbers were picked on March 29 and FDA guidelines indicate cucumbers are fresh for 10 to 14 days after being harvested, they are already largely past their shelf life, the company said in the relase. Of the 169 cartons of cucumbers distributed in Illinois and Indiana, 50 contained about 50 pounds of cucumbers each and 119 contained 24 cucumbers each, company spokeswoman Lee Anne Oxford said in an email. Of those, 50 of the 50-pound cartons and 89 of the 24-count cartons were distributed in Illinois, and all the cartons distributed in Indiana were 24-count cartons, she said. That works out to a total of about 5,000 pounds of cucumbers. L&M was not disclosing the wholesale distributors of the cucumbers, because they may have sold the produce to various retailers or restaurants. However, “The company has accounted for the entire lot of recalled product and requested that customers who may still have the recalled product in inventory remove it from commerce and destroy it immediately,” L&M said in the news release. FDA inspectors found salmonella on cucumbers in a cooler at Four Seasons Produce of Central Florida, Inc. on April 13, and informed L&M. The company recalled the entire lot of cucumbers harvested in south Florida on March 29; the largest number of cucumbers were distributed in Florida and Mississippi, but other than Illinois and Indiana, the bulk cucumbers also were sold to wholesalers in New York, Tennessee, Nebraska, Wyoming and Texas. Because the cucumbers were distributed to wholesalers, they may have been distributed to other states as well, according to the company. There are no reports of people becoming ill after having eaten the cucumbers, according to the company. Salmonella is a bacteria that can cause serious or even fatal infections in young children, and others with weakened immune systems. Salmonella symptoms include fever, diarrhea, nausea, vomiting, and abdominal pain. The bulk cartons are marked Nature’s Delight and have lot number PL-RID-002990. Anyone with questions about the recall can call L&M at 919-981-8003, although the hotline is only staffed Monday through Friday, 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. Central Time. Messages left over the weekend will be returned, according to the company.
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