Chinese authorities announced a nationwide probe yesterday into a milk powder suspected of killing one baby and sickening dozens of others, in the latest safety scandal to rock China’s food industry.
China’s health ministry also ordered all its departments nationwide to immediately report every baby with kidney stones and problems urinating, symptoms of drinking the tainted milk formula.
One baby has died and many others have been hospitalized across the country after drinking the Sanlu brand of milk powder and developing the kidney stones, the ministry said on its Web site as it announced a national probe.
“A joint inter-ministerial team has been set up to investigate responsibility and strictly deal with those responsible,” the ministry said of the team composed of police, health, commercial and drug agencies.
Guidelines on how to treat infants suffering from the tainted formula were also issued by the ministry.
The ministry late on Thursday ordered parents not to feed their babies the Sanlu milk powder, but it did not ban the milk product from being sold.
It also notified the World Health Organization (WHO), which said it was monitoring the situation and helping the Chinese government deal with it.
Sanlu has acknowledged that some of its milk powder was contaminated by the chemical tripolycyanamide, which can cause kidney stones, the ministry said.
Tripolycyanamide, also known as melamine, is a chemical used in plastics that was at the center of a China-produced pet food recall in the US last year.
At least 59 babies have developed kidney stones in the northwestern province of Gansu alone, which is also where the fatality occurred, while seven other provinces and regions around the country have discovered similar cases.
The health ministry said the Sanlu Group had ordered the recall of 700 tonnes of the baby milk powder produced before Aug. 6, after internal company investigations shoawed the formula had been contaminated.
The group is a leading state-owned dairy company based in northern China’s Hebei Province that had plans to list on the Shanghai stock exchange this year.
The public relations office at the company did not answer phone calls yesterday, while no notices about a recall or apologies were posted on its Web site.
The World Health Organization said the health ministry had informed it of the safety concerns.
“WHO is providing technical assistance to the Chinese authorities’ investigation when requested,” Hans Troedsson, WHO Representative in China, said in a statement. “We are monitoring the situation in China and for potential wider implications for other countries.”
It was not immediately clear if the suspect powder has been exported.
China has in recent years endured a series of high-profile safety scandals over its food and other products sold overseas as well as domestically.
Chinese exports of fish and dumplings as well as pet food have raised serious concerns in the US, Japan and elsewhere, leading to recalls of various products in those countries.
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