China's food safety boss quits

2008-09-22 14:09

Beijing - The head of China's food safety watchdog resigned on Monday in the wake of a scandal over tainted baby formula that sickened nearly 53 000 infants, state media reported.

The official Xinhua News Agency said Li Changjiang had stepped down with the approval of China's Cabinet.

Li's agency is responsible for ensuring that China's food supply chain is safe. His resignation comes after the chemical melamine blamed for kidney stones and kidney failure in babies was found in infant formula and other milk products from 22 of China's dairy companies.

Xinhua said Wang Yong had replaced Li as the director of the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine.

Although Xinhua said only that Li had resigned after infants had become sick after taking tainted milk products, the widespread nature of the crisis reflects a systemic breakdown in supervision of the dairy industry.

Infant formula and other milk products have been pulled from stores around the country and Chinese goods including liquid milk, instant coffee mix and milk-based candy have been banned around Asia.

On Monday the World Health Organisation urged stricter monitoring of the industry.

Sanlu Group Co, the dairy at the centre of the scandal, and several other leading companies found to have produced tainted milk had been given inspection-free status by China's product quality watchdog.

That privilege has since been rescinded, but WHO China representative Hans Troedsson stressed it was only a first step and that quality issues can crop up at any point in the supply chain, from the farm to the retail outlet.

"It's clearly something that is not acceptable and needs to be rectified and corrected," he said.

The number of sick children reported by the government jumped Sunday from 6 200 to nearly 53 000.

More than 80% of the 12 892 children hospitalised in recent weeks were two years old or younger, the Health Ministry said. It said 104 were in serious condition.

Another 39 965 children received outpatient treatment at hospitals and were considered "basically recovered", the ministry said.

Four babies' deaths have been blamed on tainted milk powder.

The ministry did not explain the sudden increase in the number of cases but it suggested health officials were combing through hospital records from May through August to trace the origins of the contamination.

- AP