BS: Chinese toothpaste

Subject: RE: BS: Chinese toothpaste
From: beardedbruce
Date: 01 Jun 07 - 09:03 PM

FDA: Throw away toothpaste made in China

POSTED: 7:21 p.m. EDT, June 1, 2007

Story Highlights•Consumers warned of potentially tainted toothpaste from China
•Suspect products may contain diethylene glycol, or DEG, used in antifreeze
• DEG found in Cooldent Fluoride, Cooldent Spearmint , Cooldent ICE
• FDA unaware of any poisoning from toothpaste in the United States

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The government warned consumers on Friday to avoid using toothpaste made in China because it may contain a poisonous chemical used in antifreeze.

Out of caution, the Food and Drug Administration said, people should throw away toothpaste with labeling that says it was made in China. The FDA is concerned that these products may contain diethylene glycol.

The agency is not aware of any poisoning from toothpaste in the United States, but it did find the antifreeze ingredient in a shipment at the U.S. border and at two retail stores: a Dollar Plus store in Miami and a Todo A Peso store in Puerto Rico.

Officials said they are primarily concerned about toothpaste sold at bargain retail outlets. The ingredient in question, called DEG, is used as a lower-cost sweetener and thickening agent. The highest concentration of the chemical found in toothpaste so far was between 3 percent and 4 percent of the product's overall weight.

"It does not belong in toothpaste even in small concentrations," said the FDA's Deborah M. Autor.

The FDA increased its scrutiny of toothpaste made in China because of reports of contamination in several countries, including Panama.

The agency is particularly concerned about chronic exposure to DEG in children and in people with kidney or liver disease.

Agency officials said they had no estimate of how many tubes of tainted toothpaste might have made it into the United States.

"Our concern today is potentially about all toothpaste that comes in from China," Autor said. "Our estimate is that China makes up about $3.3 million of the $2 billion U.S. toothpaste market."

The agency also issued an import alert Friday for all dental products containing DEG. The alert means toothpaste from China will be stopped at the border, she said.

Companies that make brands previously found with DEG will have to prove the toothpaste is free of the chemical before it's allowed into the country. Meanwhile, all other brands of Chinese-made toothpaste will be stopped for testing, something the agency has been doing since May 23.

The import alert posted by the government says DEG has been improperly used in a variety of sedatives, syrups and cough medicines worldwide. Most recently, a cough syrup containing DEG resulted in more than 40 deaths in Panama last September.

The alert says the agency found DEG in three products manufactured by Goldcredit International Trading in China. The products are Cooldent Fluoride, Cooldent Spearmint and Cooldent ICE. Analysis of the products revealed they contained between 3 percent and 4 percent DEG.

The agency also found the chemical in one product manufactured by Suzhou City Jinmao Daily Chemical Co. in China. Analysis of that product, Shir Fresh Mint Fluoride Paste, found it contained about 1 percent DEG.

China's food safety problems have in recent months become a matter of international concern, a situation reflected in trade talks between Chinese and U.S. officials in Washington last week.

Most notably, on March 15, FDA learned that certain pet foods were sickening and killing cats and dogs. FDA found contaminants in vegetable proteins imported into the United States from China and used as ingredients in pet food.

Subject: RE: BS: Chinese toothpaste
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 29 May 07 - 09:21 AM

The difficulty is that he left office a couple of years ago, and we don't know if the stuff that's been happening more recently is "legacy" from his administration, or if the current administrators are just as crooked? ineffectual? indifferent? or whatever ...

John

Subject: RE: BS: Chinese toothpaste
From: bobad
Date: 29 May 07 - 08:36 AM

Well, that should put an end to his malfeasance.

Subject: RE: BS: Chinese toothpaste
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 29 May 07 - 07:44 AM

China Gets Serious about Quality Control?

China's drug regulator to be executed

Zheng convicted of accepting bribes, dereliction of duty

China's former top drug regulator was sentenced to death Tuesday for taking bribes to approve untested medicines, as the country's main quality control agency announced its first recall system targeting unsafe food products.

The developments are among the most dramatic steps Beijing has publicly taken to address domestic and international alarm over shoddy and unsafe Chinese goods — from pet food ingredients and toothpaste mixed with industrial chemicals to tainted antibiotics.

John

Subject: RE: BS: Chinese toothpaste
From: Bill D
Date: 25 May 07 - 05:06 PM

We should not be buying so much serious stuff from a country with such a different attitude about safety and quality. There is little central authority there to oversee production to OUR standards.

Subject: RE: BS: Chinese toothpaste
From: Gurney
Date: 25 May 07 - 04:45 PM

Tetrodotoxin. One of the most poisonous substances known, and VERY hard to detect, I understand. Fugu, they call it in Japan. They play a kind of gastronomic Russian Roulette with it there.

The chinese workers I worked with once did not respond well to authoritarian orders and attitude, insofar as they would diligently do exactly what they were told to do, even when they knew it was wrong. When you asked them to tell you if they thought something was amiss, they were brilliant employees. I was QC/QA, and asked them, and listened carefully to them. Even when I moved to a different part of the plant, they would come looking for me for arbitration.

I'll bet the problem is something of this nature. Poor management.

Subject: RE: BS: Chinese toothpaste
From: Peace
Date: 25 May 07 - 10:01 AM

Stop food imports from China until they make restitution to those they have hurt or killed--until they clean up their act. Period.

Subject: RE: BS: Chinese toothpaste
From: GUEST,ib48
Date: 25 May 07 - 09:58 AM

i bought some at 2 thirty

Subject: RE: BS: Chinese toothpaste
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 25 May 07 - 05:30 AM

U.S. to China: Step up oversight of food, drugs

The Associated Press
Updated: 8:23 p.m. CT May 24, 2007

WASHINGTON - U.S. officials asked their Chinese counterparts to increase oversight of food and drug exports Thursday as the list of potentially deadly products reaching U.S. shores kept growing.

The U.S. asked China to require exporters to register with the government, amid other measures meant to provide greater assurance of the safety of their products. The requests came amid ongoing problems with Chinese exports, including chemically spiked pet food ingredients and, as of Thursday, potentially poisonous toothpaste and toxic fish.

A Chinese Embassy spokeswoman declined to comment ...

... The problems don't stop at pet food. For April, China was No. 1 in countries whose imports were stopped at the border by the Food and Drug Administration. The list includes filthy mushrooms, drug-laced frozen eel and juice made with unsafe color additives.^**

"Obviously, there is a problem in China. It keeps getting bigger and we keep seeing more problems in different realms," said Chris Waldrop of the Consumer Federation of America.

On Thursday, even more potential problems were disclosed: The FDA said it was stopping all imports of Chinese toothpaste to test for a deadly chemical reportedly found in tubes sold elsewhere in the world. The testing will look for diethylene glycol, a chemical commonly used in antifreeze and brake fluid, spokesman Doug Arbesfeld said. The imports will be released only if they test negative for the chemical. The announcement came following reports that tainted Chinese toothpaste was sold in Australia, the Dominican Republic and Panama.

The FDA also warned consumers not to buy or eat imported fish labeled as monkfish because it might actually be pufferfish, which contains a potentially deadly toxin called tetrodotoxin. Eating pufferfish that contains the potent toxin could result in serious illness or death, the FDA said.

An importer recalled 282 22-pound boxes labeled as Chinese monkfish that it distributed to Illinois, California and Hawaii, the FDA said. Two Chicago-area people became ill after eating the fish, which government testing later revealed contained life-threatening levels of tetrodotoxin. Importer Hong Chang Corp. of Santa Fe Springs, Calif., believes the fish may actually be pufferfish.

"There is a harsh reality here: When it comes to food, 'Made in China' is now a warning label in the United States," said Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., ...

When asked Thursday if consumers could trust the safety of food imported from China, von Eschenbach told The AP: "This is one area where we have an ongoing opportunity for continuous improvement and that's what we are going to pursue."<sup>***

**</sup> ... and no mention of the counterfeit pharmaceuticals?

^*** That's a govt spokesperson - always a direct answer to a direct question!!!!

John

Subject: RE: BS: Chinese toothpaste
From: Gurney
Date: 25 May 07 - 05:01 AM

Wasn't someone deliberately putting it in wine a couple of years ago? Or was that Methylene Glycol?

We did import some bandages from India some years ago, labelled with the sacred BP, which means 'To British Pharmaceutical Standard.'
The packages also contained dust, and in one case, a leaf!

The Spinach scare is about E.coli 0157:H7, according to Readers Digest. 3 people, including a 2yo in Idaho, died last September, and 102 hospitalisations. River pollution with animal excreta in California blamed. 2 other outbreaks since. Oz got some too.

Spinach, for heavens sake!

Subject: RE: BS: Chinese toothpaste
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 25 May 07 - 12:17 AM

In a posting at the thread BS: Poison Pet Food:

"Toxic medicine in Panama traced to China is a short article that appeared in my local paper today, so probably has had fairly wide publication.

" From China to Panama, a Trail of Poisoned Medicine is a longer and more informative article from the New York times that appeared (in an extracted version)yesterday at MSNBC but appears to be no longer there. (I'd suggest looking soon at the NYT article, as they tend to remove stuff to a "for fee" archive after a week or so.)"

There have been numerous other reports of counterfeit food products, pharmaceuticals, and chemicals being exported from China. Some articles that appeared briefly and then seem to have "unhappened" lamented that food and medicinal adulteration, counterfeiting, false labeling, and other frauds are so prevalent within China, victimizing their own people, that it's considered "business as usual."

Both articles above cite numerous cases in which at least one Chinese counterfeiter substituted diethylene glycol for glycerine, labelling the product as 99.5% pure glycerine. The phony material was used in numerous pharmaceutical products, as yet not completely indentified. Since glycerine is a "universal ingredient" in a vast range of pharmaceuticals, several hundred deaths have been documented and specifically linked to the counterfeit product. Circumstantial evidence indicates that several thousand - and potentially severeal hundred thousand - "unexplained deaths" are due to this one counterfeit product.

John

Subject: RE: BS: Chinese toothpaste
From: gnu
Date: 24 May 07 - 05:15 PM

Well, we here in Canuckville have recently been warned about tomatoes, lettuce, spinach and other greens, and peanut butter from the US.

Peanut butter. Dear Lord. PEANUT BUTTER!!!! Is nothing sacred?!

Oh yeah.... chickens and turkeys from the US are strictly off the list here. Been like that for years.

Subject: RE: BS: Chinese toothpaste
From: GUEST
Date: 24 May 07 - 03:38 PM

I just got a certified-letter recall notice on the titanium plate in my head. No kidding. It was manufactured in the USA though. Sure, I'll just be popping that sucker out and putting it in the convenient, self-addressed, postage-paid envelope. NOT! Okay, I am kidding about the envelope....but not the rest.

Subject: BS: Chinese toothpaste
From: beardedbruce
Date: 24 May 07 - 03:30 PM

U.S. checking all toothpaste imports from China
POSTED: 10:48 p.m. EDT, May 23, 2007

Story Highlights• FDA takes step after tainted product turns up in other countries
• No evidence any tainted toothpaste has entered United States, FDA says
• Toothpaste containing lethal chemical found in Panama, Dominican Republic
• China's standards under scrutiny after pet food contaminated by melamine

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -- U.S. health officials are beginning to check all shipments of t:oothpaste coming from China, following reports of tainted products in other countries, a government spokesman said Wednesday.

The Food and Drug Administration has no evidence that contaminated toothpaste has made its way into the United States but is taking the step as a precaution, agency spokesman Doug Arbesfeld said.

China is the second-largest exporter of toothpaste to the United States behind Canada, according to the FDA.

The FDA's action comes after the lethal chemical diethylene glycol was found in toothpaste sold in the Dominican Republic and Panama.

It follows a wave of concern over pet food from China containing another toxic chemical, melamine, thought to have sickened thousands of U.S. cats and dogs and made its way into livestock feed.

"We are going to be sampling and testing all shipments of toothpaste that come from China," Arbesfeld said. "We're doing this as a precautionary measure. We have no evidence that toothpaste containing diethylene glycol has entered the country."

Tests on product pulled from shelves in Panama showed they contained high levels of diethylene glycol, used in engine coolants. Investigators in that country said two toothpaste brands were imported illegally from China through a free-trade zone.

Tainted toothpaste has also been reported in Australia, Arbesfeld said.

It was not immediately clear which brands of toothpaste sold in the Unites States are made in China.

A representative of Johnson & Johnson's McNeil-PPC Inc., which makes Rembrandt toothpaste, could not be immediately reached.

A spokeswoman for Colgate-Palmolive, maker of Colgate toothpaste, said the company did not import toothpaste into the United States from China.

A Procter & Gamble spokeswoman said Crest brand toothpaste was American-made. A spokeswoman for GlaxoSmithKline Plc's consumer unit, which makes Aquafresh, had no immediate comment.

Chinese officials have said they plan to strengthen domestic food safety even as worries grow about its manufacturers' use of toxins and fake ingredients.

Earlier Wednesday, China called for an investigative team to probe the toothpaste incidents.

FDA's Arbesfeld said the U.S. agency is beginning its work immediately and will continue for 90 days, although that could be extended.

Arbesfeld added that the agency has been in contact with health officials in the other affected countries as well as China.