Can’t Teach an Old Dog New Tricks

Like an old dog that can’t learn new tricks, Wal-Mart still hasn’t learned how to remove recalled products off its shelves.  And according to from the Straits Times, this sort of negligence can be deadly.

On September 12, we noted that Wal-Mart stores in Shanghai had not removed milk powder from their shelves, despite ongoing recalls around the rest of China.  According to an article from Ifeng, milk sales were continuing “as usual”.  Now, the media is reporting that “up to five per cent of infants in Shanghai could have kidney stones after drinking tainted milk formula” and that a Wal-Mart store in Macao is still selling Chinese milk.

How many children must die before Wal-Mart learns how to effectively recall products? From melamine tainted infant formula to bassinets with strangulation hazards and to lead tainted bibs and toys, Wal-Mart has continually dragged its feet on recalling dangerous products, particularly for children and babies - making clear that the retailer’s profit motives come before the safety of their customers.

Please, Wal-Mart, before we read the headline next week “Macao Mother Looses Child Due to Melamine Tainted Milk from Wal-Mart” take action and remove these products from your shelves in a systematic, responsible way.

5% of Shanghai kids ill [Straits Times]

UP TO five per cent of infants in Shanghai could have kidney stones after drinking tainted milk formula, media reported on Friday, as publicity surrounding the scandal was muted by China’s manned space launch.

Beijing is battling public alarm and international dismay after thousands of Chinese children were hospitalised, sick from infant milk formula tainted with melamine, a cheap industrial chemical that can be used to cheat quality checks.

‘A recent city-wide health check of children under three years old showed about five per cent were diagnosed with symptoms of possible kidney stones after being fed contaminated powdered milk,’ the China Daily reported.

The paper did not give an estimate of the number of children who might be affected.

The number of children known to have been hospitalised after consuming toxic formula tainted with melamine remained at 13,000, with China’s Health Ministry not having provided any updated casualty figures for close to a week.

At least four infants have died.

‘We don’t expect a large increase in the number of deaths, because we have to remember that a child usually doesn’t die from a kidney stone itself, but from its complications,’ World Health Organisation China representative Hans Troedsson told a news conference.

‘...the treatment has been shown (to be) effective in China,’ he said.

In Hong Kong, the government said a fifth child was suffering kidney problems related to drinking tainted milk. The 10-year-old boy was found to have kidney stones.

The European Commission proposed on Thursday tests and restrictions on Chinese food products containing powdered milk as Unicef and the World Health Organisation called China’s growing milk scandal ‘deplorable’.

Three Taiwanese children who have been consuming Chinese milk formula have also developed kidney stones and doctors were checking whether their illnesses were linked to tainted products, an official said on Friday.

The patients included two 3-year-old girls and a one-year-old boy, all traveling frequently between Taiwan and China with their parents, said Mr Liu Yi-lien, health chief of Ilan County government in eastern Taiwan.

One of the girls’ mothers also has kidney stones, he added.

‘They have all consumed Chinese milk, but more tests are needed to establish the link to their kidney stones,’ Liu said.

They are the first reported cases on the island of illnesses that may be related to using tainted Chinese milk products.

In Shanghai, the producer of China’s popular White Rabbit Creamy Candies said it would stop domestic sales of such sweets as a ‘conscientious decision to protect consumers’, Xinhua news agency quoted an official as saying.

The candy’s producer, Guanshengyuan, had earlier recalled its exports to more than 50 countries after the White Rabbit sweets tested positive for melamine in Singapore and Hong Kong.

Hong Kong’s health department said in its latest tests on mainland milk products that none of 105 samples had been found to be contaminated with melamine.

Nitrogen-rich melamine can be added to substandard or watered-down milk to fool quality checks, which often use nitrogen levels to measure the amount of protein in milk.

The chemical is used in pesticides and in making plastics.

In Taiwan, Pizza Hut stopped providing packets of powdered cheese that come as a condiment with its pizzas after it learned from the supplier that the product contained melamine, spokesman Felisa Wu said.

She added that Pizza Hut’s pizzas in Taiwan were not affected because they use cheese from the US and New Zealand.

A day after a spate of countries in Europe and Asia announced precautionary bans on imports of Chinese milk products, coverage of the scandal has been scaled back to make room for China’s successful launch of its third manned space mission.

Millions across China watched the launch on live television on Thursday and images of the rocket blasting off were splashed across newspapers.

Newspaper editorials feted the technological milestone as another great leap forward for China after the Beijing Olympics.

Posted by Michael Mignano on Friday, September 26, 2008

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