FDA to open offices in China

Didn't take much, just a few thousand dead pets, contaminated baby toys, and oh yeah, the heparin thing... but the FDA just announced it's opening three offices in China. From the Irish Times:

The co-operation is significant. It's a sign of how China's growing openness is combining with its need to improve its international standing in the pharmaceutical business, and Chinese health authorities hope the offices will also increase China's own capacity to produce safe foods, drugs and medical devices. Thirteen employees would be assigned to work there.



The move is also a reaction by the FDA to criticism over its lack of overseas inspections after heparin, a widely used blood thinner, was contaminated and imported from China earlier this year. Heparin has been linked to more than 80 deaths in the United States.



[...]



Beijing has been under pressure to do something about consumer safety, after a series of scandals in the past couple of years did serious damage to the "Made in China" brand. Billions of euro worth of counterfeit and substandard goods, including snack bars, liquor, medicines and face creams, are produced every year in China and there are regular horror stories.



In one of the most highly publicised scandals, China revealed in 2004 that 13 babies had died from malnutrition in the eastern province of Anhui after being fed fake baby milk powder.



In July last year, Zheng Xiaoyu, formerly China's drug and food safety czar, was executed for corruption.

Ah yes, I'll never forget listening to a reporter asking FDA food safety czar David Acheson what he thought about that sentence during a pet food recall media conference last year. Good times.



Full article here.



[Update] From the comments, h/t to Nadine L.: It must be the night for remembering the pet food recall. USA Today's Julie Schmit continues her tradition of excellent coverage of the issue with an update on the ongoing lawsuits against Menu Foods and other companies for harm suffered by pets who ate contaminated foods:

Almost 6,000 claims have been filed in a class-action settlement stemming from last year's massive pet-food recall.

Menu Foods, other pet-food makers and retailers in May agreed to set up a $24 million cash fund to compensate pet owners whose cats and dogs became sick or died after eating food that had a contaminated ingredient from China.

The filing period for claims began May 30 and will run until Nov. 24.

"I expect that number (of claims) will go up a lot. There's quite a bit of time to go," says attorney Sherrie Savett of plaintiffs' law firm Berger & Montague.

Julie apparently never drank the "13 confirmed deaths" kool-aid:

The Food and Drug Administration never identified how many pets were affected, but it received more than 17,000 complaints.

[....]

The recall grew to involve 12 pet-food makers and 180 brands of pet food and treats. Along with Menu, other defendants include Hill's Pet Nutrition, Iams and retailers such as Wal-Mart.

Menu Foods, which supplied most of the recalled foods, has pegged its recall costs at $55 million, some of which went to the settlement fund.

If there is money remaining after claims have been processed, it will go to charities that promote the well-being of pets, the settlement says.

A website has been set up at www.petfoodsettlement.com. The claims administrator can be reached at 800-392-7785.

Catch it here.

Comments

[Anne T]

And how is FDA/ the Federal Gov't going to pay for this on a drastically reduced FDA budget? Setting up offices overseas when food saftey can't be dealt with here in the US? Oh yes, I know! Add to the 53 trillion dollar National deficit by selling more treasury bonds to...hold it.....China!

[2CatMom]

Now I wouldn't want to bring politics into this, but when you go to vote in November, you might want to figure out which candidate/party believes that industries can regulate themselves and which one doesn't. Which candidate/party believes in 'smaller' government achieved through the defunding of agencies and which candidate/party believes that government has a role and responsibility in protecting the American consumer.



Just a thought.

[Nadine L.]

Pet food recall leads to 6,000 claims in a class action settlement .. and counting.



If your dog or cat became ill or died from the contaminated food, there is still time to file your claim.



Yet another excellent article today by Julie Schmit of USA Today here:



http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/manufacturing/2008-08-25-pet-food-recall_N.htm

[The OTHER Pat]

To get Amazon's free shipping on the new Nestle "Pet Food Politics" book, I believe I'd need to buy three copies. I'm thinking about one for me, and a couple for my elected representatives . . . . . . . .

[Janeen]

OK, explain the math to me. Do two corrupt entities added together make a positive?

[Dutch]

-1 (US FDA) -1 (US/China FDA) = -2



So I guess two corrupt entities added together make a mess twice as big as you thought they ever would.