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On this day in 2009, Chinese citizens Zhang Yujun and Geng Jinping were shot to death in connection with China’s tainted milk scandal. The affair caused some 300,000 infants to became sick, six of them fatally. They were killed by powdered milk tainted with melamine, an industrial chemical used in plastics and fertilizer. Zhang, a dairy farmer from the province of Hebei, sold hundreds of tons of tainted milk powder in 2007 and 2008; he was the largest supplier. Geng supplied toxic milk to dairy companies. The scandal was stupendous and made headlines all over the world. According to Time...

The new material is a two-dimensional polymer that self-assembles into sheets, unlike all other polymers, which form one-dimensional, spaghetti-like chains. Such a material could be used as a lightweight, durable coating for car parts or cell phones, or as a building material for bridges or other structures... Strano and his colleagues came up with a new polymerization process that allows them to generate a two-dimensional sheet called a polyaramide. For the monomer building blocks, they use a compound called melamine, which contains a ring of carbon and nitrogen atoms. Under the right conditions, these monomers can grow in two dimensions,...

News From The American Chemical Society, May 13, 200919 May 2009    Advance in detecting melamine-adulterated food Researchers in Indiana are reporting an advance toward faster, more sensitive tests for detecting melamine, the substance that killed at least 6 children and sickened 300,000 children in China who drank milk and infant formula adulterated with the substance. The improved tests may ease global concerns about food safety, the researchers say. Their report is scheduled for the May 27 issue of ACS' Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry, a bi-weekly publication. In the new study, Lisa Mauer and colleagues note that tests...

Tian Wenhua, 66, has appealed against her conviction at a court in Shijiazhuang last month, as have the three other executives from Sanlu, who were given jail terms of between five and 15 years. In an interview with the Daily Telegraph, Mrs Tian's lawyer, Liang Zikan, launched an attack against the Chinese authorities, suggesting that his client was made a scapegoat and that the local authorities were aware of the problems at Sanlu but failed to act. His condemnation of the trial is one of the strongest criticisms ever to be voiced about China's lack of legal transparency and the...

The scandal over tainted milk powder led to a 10 percent fall in Chinese dairy exports by volume and a rise in foreign imports last year, state media said Saturday, citing the customs department. Dozens of countries pulled Chinese dairy products from their shelves in 2008 after it emerged that the industrial chemical melamine had been added to milk to artificially boost its protein content. "Lots of foreign countries stopped importing dairy products from China, and the country's milk industry suffered severely," the Xinhua news agency quoted a customs report as saying.

The Chinese melamine scandal is expected to claim more lives after the country’s courts sentenced two people with alleged involvement in last year’s contamination to death and imprisoned an industry executive, say news reports. Tian Wenhua, who until last year headed Sanlu, one of the country’s leading dairy producers, faces life in prison for her role in allegedly turning allowing the sale of dangerous and substandard products, the Reuters news agency reported. Sanlu, which is partly owned by New Zealand-based cooperative Fonterra and has filed for bankruptcy as of this month, was one of a number of groups, including Arla...

China's milk scandal is a political temblor Selling contaminated baby formula is a heinous enough crime to shock a nation, but China's leaders know they have a dangerously destabilizing political crisis on their hands. The scandal goes to the heart of a covenant between any authoritarian regime and those who surrender freedom. They cede power with the belief, however wishful, they will be better off. Those in power promise to protect them from all manner of hazards, foreign and domestic.

US parents want answers after China milk scare By DEANNA MARTIN The Associated Press Friday, January 2, 2009; 1:58 PM -- Beth Flanders was on her way to China to adopt her 17-month-old daughter in September when she received a warning from her adoption agency: An industrial chemical that can cause kidney stones had been found in Chinese baby formula, and parents should not feed it to their new children. Flanders' daughter had no symptoms. But in November, an ultrasound revealed two kidney stones, which are unusual in children. Now the Los Angeles-area nurse wonders if melamine is to blame.

Appeals may delay payments in pet food case By GEOFF MULVIHILL | Associated Press Writer 2:56 PM EST, December 30, 2008 MOUNT LAUREL, N.J. - More than 23,000 pet owners in the United States have asked for money from a $24 million settlement for owners of dogs and cats who were sickened or died after eating pet food contaminated with an industrial chemical.

China, fighting a health scandal over melamine found in milk and other food products, now says it is investigating melamine tableware, following reports it might be harmful to health when hot. Quality inspectors told Xinhua news agency they were organising tests of melamine tableware "following reports that some products contained poisonous ingredients." Melamine is an industrial compound used in making plastic chairs, countertops, tableware, flame retardants and even concrete. It was added by unscrupulous manufacturers to food to cheat nutrition tests due to its high nitrogen content. The melamine scandal has battered faith in China-made products, after a series of...

Industry experts and businesspeople in China say that the industrial chemical has been routinely added to fish and animal feed to artificially boost protein readings. Reporting from Los Angeles and Shanghai--Melamine in Chinese-produced milk powder has sickened hundreds of thousands of children and added to a growing list of made-in-China foods banned across the globe.Now, some scientists and consumer advocates are raising concerns that fish from China may also be contaminated with the industrial chemical. China is the world's largest producer of farm-raised seafood, exporting billions of dollars worth of shrimp, catfish, tilapia, salmon and other fish.The U.S. imported about...

90 Percent of U.S. Infant Formula May Be Contaminated with Melamine; FDA Abruptly Declares Chemical Safe for Babies (NaturalNews) Up to 90 percent of the infant formula sold in the United States may be contaminated with trace amounts of melamine, the toxic chemical linked to kidney damage, according to recent tests. The FDA's test results, which the agency hid from the public and only released after the Associated Press filed a Freedom of Information Act request, showed that Nestle, Mead Johnson and Enfamil infant formula products were all contaminated with melamine. The FDA has no new science to justify its...

Want to know what organic chickens are fed? If it's soy meal from China -- a cheap source of protein -- it may also contain melamine. That's what happened with 300 tons of soy meal being fed to organic chicken in western France. Authorities discovered the soy meal contained an astonishing 50 times the maximum limit of melamine: 116mg per kg of soy meal. This cheap Chinese soy meal was delivered to 127 "organic" chicken farms in France. Nobody yet knows how many organic chicken farms in the U.S., Canada, U.K. or Australia might also be feeding their chickens toxic...

China reports huge increase in children sickened by tainted milk by Karl Malakunas Karl Malakunas Mon Dec 1, 10:40 pm ET BEIJING (AFP) – China has dramatically raised the tally of children sickened by dairy products laced with the industrial chemical melamine to 294,000, more than five times the original figure. In a late-night statement on Monday, the health ministry also said six babies may have died from consuming poisoned milk, up from a previous confirmed death toll of three. The updated figures showed the problem over contaminated milk in China this year was much greater than the government had...

90 Percent of U.S. Infant Formula May Be Contaminated with Melamine; FDA Abruptly Declares Chemical Safe for Babies Saturday, November 29, 2008 by: Mike Adams, NaturalNews Editor Key concepts: Melamine, Infant formula and The FDA (NaturalNews) Up to 90 percent of the infant formula sold in the United States may be contaminated with trace amounts of melamine, the toxic chemical linked to kidney damage, according to recent tests. The FDA's test results, which the agency hid from the public and only released after the Associated Press filed a Freedom of Information Act request, showed that Nestle, Mead Johnson and Enfamil...

Nov. 26, 2008 -- Tiny "trace" amounts of potentially toxic melamine reportedly detected in U.S.-made infant formula pose little if any risk to kids, experts tell WebMD. Investigative reporters for the Associated Press obtained FDA documents showing the agency has been testing U.S. made baby formula for melamine. According to the AP report, one brand of formula contained very small amounts of melamine. Another brand contained similarly tiny amounts of cyanuric acid, a related chemical. And a third maker of infant formula told the AP that its own tests detected small amounts of melamine in its product.

<p>Two months ago, federal food regulators said they were unable to set a safety threshold for the industrial chemical melamine in baby formula. Now, however, they found a way to settle on a standard that allows for higher levels than those found in U.S.-made batches of the product. Food and Drug Administration officials on Friday set a threshold of 1 part per million of melamine in formula, provided a related chemical is not present. They insisted the formulas are safe.</p>

Public health groups, consumer advocates and members of Congress blasted the Food and Drug Administration yesterday for failing to act after discovering trace amounts of the industrial chemical melamine in baby formula sold in the United States. "This FDA, this Bush administration, instead of protecting the public health, is protecting industry," said Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.), who chairs the Appropriations subcommittee that oversees the FDA budget. In an interview, DeLauro said she wants the agency to disclose its findings and to develop a plan to remove melamine from formula. "We're talking about babies, about the most vulnerable. This really makes...

Traces of the industrial chemical melamine have been detected in samples of top-selling U.S. infant formula, but federal regulators insist the products are safe. The Food and Drug Administration said last month it was unable to identify any melamine exposure level as safe for infants, but a top official said it would be a "dangerous overreaction" for parents to stop feeding infant formula to babies who depend on it. "The levels that we are detecting are extremely low," said Dr. Stephen Sundlof, director of the FDA's Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition. "They should not be changing the diet....

WASHINGTON -- The Food and Drug Administration said it found "trace levels" of the industrial chemical melamine in one sample of U.S.-made infant formula and in a few samples of products like nutritional and medical supplements, all made by the five U.S. manufacturers of infant formula. The FDA said, however, that the formula and the supplements were safe to consume. The agency declined to identify the companies and brand names of the products involved. But the nation's five FDA-approved makers of milk-based infant formulas are Abbott Laboratories, Bristol-Myer Squibb Co. Nestlé SA's Nestlé USA unit, PBM Products LLC and Solus...