More than 6,200 babies have been sickened by tainted milk formula and dozens of infants are suffering from acute kidney failure, China's health minister said Wednesday as the death toll rose to three children.How did the baby formula or milk get contaminated?
Health Minister Chen Zhu said he expected the numbers of affected babies to increase as "more and more parents take kids to the hospital."
Meanwhile, the head of China's quality control watchdog agency, Li Changjiang, said that 5,000 inspectors will be dispatched nationwide to monitor companies after government testing showed that 20 percent of the companies producing milk powder had dairy products with melamine.
Also Wednesday, the country's two largest dairy companies, Mengniu Dairy Co. and Yili Industrial Group Co., were among the companies forced to recall baby formula. In addition, Guangdong-based Yashili and Qingdao-based Suncare recalled their tainted milk powder, which is exported to five countries in Africa and Asia: Bangladesh, Yemen, Gabon, Burundi and Myanmar.
It was done on purpose.
Someone added the chemical melamine to the formula or milk in order to increase the protein content in watered down milk for purposes of testing, and the chemical causes kidney failure or death.
Several people have already been arrested, but that will be of little comfort to those families who are watching their children suffer horribly from these dastardly act.
The concern is that some of this formula has ended up in markets outside China, including the US.
China is saying that they will begin testing milk and formula for melamine. It's about time, given that this issue has appeared before.
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