Chinese exports pose health risk
By PHYLLIS SCHLAFLY Copley News Service

The scandal of imported products from China has accelerated to a level that the public should demand "China-free" labels on anything that goes into a mouth. This includes not only food, vitamins and medicines but toothpaste and toys which, as all parents know, go into children's mouths.

The U.S. recall of nearly 1 million toys sold by Fisher-Price, because its paint contains excessive amounts of lead, is only the latest in a string of Chinese product safety scandals. It would take a couple of generations and many billions of dollars to bring Chinese food up to U.S. health and safety standards.

Nearly half of China's population lives without sewage treatment, and the water isn't safe, whether from the tap or in the sea or a pond.

In May, 900,000 tubes of toothpaste imported from China were withdrawn because tests showed that glycerine had been replaced by diethylene glycol, a chemical used in antifreeze. This poisoned toothpaste has turned up in U.S. hospitals, prisons, and juvenile detention centers.

The United States imports 80 percent of the seafood consumed by Americans, and China is the largest foreign source. The FDA rejected 51 shipments of catfish, eel, shrimp, and tilapia because of contaminants such as salmonella, veterinary drugs, and a cancercausing chemical called nitrofuran.

Last year, China sold $675 million in pharmaceutical ingredients and products to the United States.

The FDA inspects 1 percent of our imports from China. It's not realistic to believe that doubling or tripling the inspection rate would make any significant difference in the safety of foods or toys.

Nor would FDA on-site inspection of producers in China be practical.

When FDA investigators visited China in May, they found factories closed, machinery dismantled, and records destroyed.