An authoritative analysis of the milk crisis to date:

“BEIJING — Like thousands of other parents, Gu Yinghua took his child to the kidney unit of a local children’s hospital for free testing as China’s tainted-milk scandal continued to widen.

Another hospital had declared the 3-year-old boy healthy despite a steady diet of two brands of milk powder and two kinds of milk linked to a toxin that can cause kidney stones. But then his face began to swell.

The second hospital diagnosed kidney disease but not kidney stones, telling a disbelieving Gu to pay upfront for treatment that could last six months to two years. Gu and his wife, Xu Chongju, said they feel doubly cheated and are certain their son’s illness is connected to China’s latest food safety scare, which has outraged Chinese consumers, embarrassed the government and spurred food recalls in Europe and Asia…”

A Reuters report shows telling scenes from China and offers summary and analysis:
“The position that China now finds itself in is a result of unscrupulous farmers and engligent food companies. Tests show that in an attempt to cut costs, the nitrogen-rich compound melamine was added to water down milk, in order to pass quality inspections. Contamination was thought to be restricted to powdered baby milk, but officials have confirmed that 10 percent of liquid milk from three of china’s dairies was also tainted with melamine. The companies have been named as Mengniu Dairy Group, Yili Industrial Group, and Bright Dairy…”

Gourmet grub from the government’s Special Food Supply Center:
“BEIJING - While China grapples with its latest tainted food crisis, the political elite are served the choicest, safest delicacies. They get hormone-free beef from the grasslands of Inner Mongolia, organic tea from the foothills of Tibet and rice watered by melted mountain snow.

And it’s all supplied by a special government outfit that provides all-organic goods from farms working under the strictest guidelines.

That secure food supply stands in stark contrast to the frustrations of ordinary citizens who have faced recurring food scandals — vegetables with harmful pesticide residue, fish tainted with a cancer-causing chemical, eggs colored with industrial dye, fake liquor causing blindness or death, holiday pastries with bacteria-laden filling.

Now that the country’s most reputable dairies have been found selling baby formula and other milk products tainted with an industrial chemical that can cause kidney stones and kidney failure, many Chinese don’t know what to buy. Tens of thousands of children have been sickened and four babies have died…”

Richard Spencer compares crises in China’s public health and its environment:

“Life and politics would be much easier if everything was like a football match, where at the end of every day you could check the score and see if the manager should be sacked.

How bad’s the economy? Fifteen new companies formed, two went bust, let’s hear it for the Chancellor (some hope).

As we know it isn’t. News reports are the nearest you get, and all too often the wider issue is buried in some catch-all phrase: “China’s rivers are notoriously polluted” blah blah in some worthy report on drinking water which doesn’t tell you what you really want to know: how bad is it, compared to what it realistically could be? Is China losing on polluted rivers 3-0 or just 1-0, and how far through the second half are we, should the final whistle be the point where we all die?

The great thing about the Beijing Olympics pollution restrictions is that it was like a football score. Well, in some ways, it WAS a football score: we had the environment bureau’s readings for air pollution all round the city, which may have been massaged at the edges and partial (no ozone) but still gave you an idea of the before and after realities.”

China’s milk scandal is the tip of the iceberg in a crisis of ethics:

“BEIJING - As Chinese officials warned Tuesday that contaminated milk powder may have sickened more than the 1,200 babies already identified, the scandal revealed more than a recurrent regulatory problem, Chinese and foreign experts suggested.

Rather, they said, it pointed to a deeper malaise in Chinese society where private profit often trumps the public good as the country races to create a market economy that has outstripped government regulators.

‘China has the problems of any transitional economy,’ says Yanzhong Huang, a global health expert at Seton Hall University in South Orange, N.J. ‘But the deeper and more fundamental challenge China faces is a systematic lack of business ethics.’”

A health ministry investigation will lead to punishment for producers of contaminated baby milk powder:

“BEIJING (AFP) - China on Friday vowed to punish those responsible for contaminating baby milk powder that has killed one infant and sickened dozens, as it emerged the producer knew about the problem a month ago.

The health ministry said an initial investigation had confirmed the tainted milk powder was to blame for the nationwide spate of cases of kidney stones in babies, the state Xinhua news agency reported.

Investigators also found the producer of the formula, Sanlu, knew it was contaminated with melamine in August, but did not release the information until after reports of sick babies began to emerge this week, the ministry said.

‘Those responsible for the contaminated milk will face severe punishment,’ Xinhua quoted an official with the government investigation team as saying. …”

A round-up of front-page news in China involving cases of fraud:
“Police in Humen, Guangdong Province busted a fake beer producer yesterday, reports today’s Dongguan Times. The article said that the producer replaced the labels and caps of cheap Shanshui-brand beer with those of the more expensive Tsingtao beer, creating three thousand fake Tsingtao beer bottles in a single day. The big photo on the front page shows the water tank which was used to remove the labels…”