As I’m sure you’ve all heard Cadbury has announced that it has found the chemical melamine in it’s chocolate products made at it’s factory in Beijing. This is believed to be related to the melamine found in powdered milk for babies that so far has caused the deaths of four infants and other medical problems in 54,000 others that we know of.
Melamine as you may know is used to create a thermosetting plastic resin. One of it’s main problems is it’s tendency form insoluble crystals in the bloodstream that can cause blockages in the kidneys. This is not nice stuff. As an engineer I was involved in a few projects back in the day where we had to use expensive specialized equipment to contain any spills and fugitive emissions of this chemical. It was “not-good”. However what it does do is mimic protein content in testing so as USA Today states it’s inclusion into the food chain may not be accidental. I tend to buy into this theory.
China is of course the same country that gave us previous problems of lead paint in our baby toys, melamine in pet food and chemicals in their farmed raised fish. .. Enough… Apparently Chinese food products are not to be trusted and the FDA can’t be relied on to catch any problems.
So the lesson here is that Organic is really different. Now we often here that it’s a waste of money and that compared to standard food there’s no difference. Well sometimes in the real world of production especially in poorly regulated countries there might be a big difference. And the danger is getting lulled into a state of “OK, now that’s taken care of. Now we’re good.” Well, maybe the FDA guy said that about the farmed raised fish as he was munching on his Cadbury Bar during his break. .. So as a general rule try to eat organic if you can. .. And if you can’t then consider making a conscience choice not to consume any food products of Chinese origin, it’s just too iffy.
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Hi! I was surfing and found your blog post… nice! I love your blog.
Cheers! Sandra. R.