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Tainted toothpaste took unchecked route
2007-08-10
Each week, prison guards brought Sherri Painter a fresh tube of SpringFresh toothpaste. She was OK with the spearmint taste, plus it was good at removing stains and cleaning shoes. Muzi.com News 10047977-0 (muzi.com)Then one day in June, guards told her to turn in her SpringFresh because it was among more than a dozen brands of Chinese-made toothpaste found to contain a poisonous chemical used in antifreeze. Muzi.com News 10047977-1 (muzi.com) Georgia officials had stocked SpringFresh in 39 prisons and dozens of other state facilities. One tube was found to contain one of the highest concentrations of the poison in any toothpaste shipped to the U.S., according to the Food and Drug Administration. Muzi.com News 10047977-2 (muzi.com) "I was blown away," said Painter, a 31-year-old convicted carjacker at Atlanta's Metro State Prison. Muzi.com News 10047977-3 (muzi.com) At the request of The Associated Press, a New Jersey company traced the shipping of the SpringFresh toothpaste, demonstrating how it followed an unchecked route from a Chinese factory to Painter's prison cell. Federal regulators did not look for the poison until they saw news reports about it being found in toothpaste in Panama, the Dominican Republic and Australia. Muzi.com News 10047977-4 (muzi.com) The manufacturer substituted toxic diethylene glycol -- or DEG -- for a more expensive sweetener. The Chinese government did not see it as a hazard and let it pass through customs. Muzi.com News 10047977-5 (muzi.com) Experts say it's unlikely that anyone -- even a child -- could ingest enough tainted toothpaste to become seriously ill. But the disagreement between Chinese and U.S. officials about the chemical reflects many of the issues in the U.S.-China import crisis. Muzi.com News 10047977-6 (muzi.com) Chinese goods now account for 60 percent of all consumer-product recalls in the United States. Safety scares such as the one involving toothpaste have become an all-too-common problem, said Donald Mays, a product-safety expert for Consumers Union. Muzi.com News 10047977-7 (muzi.com) "It is indicative of a major concern we have about unscrupulous business practices in China," Mays said. Muzi.com News 10047977-8 (muzi.com) ___ Muzi.com News 10047977-9 (muzi.com) CHINA Muzi.com News 10047977-10 (muzi.com) The SpringFresh toothpaste was made in a manufacturing plant in the eastern city of Suzhou, a tourist spot famed for its gardens. The nondescript two-story facility is an industrial area about a 30-minute drive from the heart of town, tucked in a maze of factories. Muzi.com News 10047977-11 (muzi.com) Some 90 people live and work in the plant, operated by the Suzhou Qingxin Daily Chemical Co. Ltd. The company has been making SpringFresh for at least five years, the manager said. Muzi.com News 10047977-12 (muzi.com) Under U.S. standards, America-made toothpaste is customarily made with glycerin, a sweetener that holds together other ingredients. But the Suzhou plant substituted DEG, which also is used in industrial solvents. Muzi.com News 10047977-13 (muzi.com) U.S. scientists discovered the chemical's dangers in 1937, when at least 105 people died after taking a medicine made in Tennessee that contained DEG. It has periodically resurfaced as a deadly additive, including last year in Panama, when DEG-tainted cough syrup and other medicines triggered the deaths of at least 90 people. Muzi.com News 10047977-14 (muzi.com) It's not clear where Suzhou Qingxin Daily Chemical got the DEG. After speaking to The Associated Press once, the company's general manager, Liu Changqing, could not be reached about that question. Muzi.com News 10047977-15 (muzi.com) In China, DEG is traditionally cheaper than glycerin, and there was no government prohibition against using it. Muzi.com News 10047977-16 (muzi.com) The FDA allows only trace amounts of DEG in toothpaste. But Chinese officials maintain that toothpaste containing less than 15.6 percent DEG, by weight, is harmless. Muzi.com News 10047977-17 (muzi.com) "This may be just a case of different standards and opinions," Liu said. Muzi.com News 10047977-18 (muzi.com) The Chinese government does not check DEG levels in products like toothpaste, said Mengshi Lin, a University of Missouri food scientist who in the late 1990s was a Chinese government export inspector. Muzi.com News 10047977-19 (muzi.com) Chinese inspections instead focus on human food, he said. Muzi.com News 10047977-20 (muzi.com) China's food inspections have come under fire, too. U.S. inspectors this year banned or recalled a number of Chinese food exports, including drug-laced frozen eel and juice made with unsafe color additives. Muzi.com News 10047977-21 (muzi.com) Global customers' concerns gradually seem to be pushing Chinese officials to make changes, experts said. On July 11, Beijing banned DEG from toothpaste. Muzi.com News 10047977-22 (muzi.com) Meanwhile, large U.S. retailers have been placing inspectors in Chinese factories to watch for safety or quality problems, Mays said. Muzi.com News 10047977-23 (muzi.com) Dollar stores and smaller retailers that received much of the DEG-tainted toothpaste generally cannot afford to place inspectors overseas, he added. Muzi.com News 10047977-24 (muzi.com) Since 9/11, the U.S. Department of Customs and Border Protection has placed inspectors at ports in 19 countries. But the agency has no one in China because officials do not have a necessary agreement with the Chinese government. Muzi.com News 10047977-25 (muzi.com) Even if customs inspectors were in China, their focus would be explosives and weapons of mass destruction -- not toiletries. The FDA is responsible for toothpaste, and has no inspectors permanently stationed in China. Muzi.com News 10047977-26 (muzi.com) ___ Muzi.com News 10047977-27 (muzi.com) SEATTLE AND TACOMA Muzi.com News 10047977-28 (muzi.com) PIERS Global Intelligence Solutions, a commerce data company based in New Jersey, traced the shipping of the SpringFresh toothpaste for The Associated Press. The company found 17 shipments of SpringFresh to the United States in 2006 and 2007, on vessels that departed Shanghai, Yantian and Hong Kong. All came in through the ports of Tacoma or Seattle. Muzi.com News 10047977-29 (muzi.com) American Amenities, a family-owned importing business based in Woodinville, Wash., received the shipments. Muzi.com News 10047977-30 (muzi.com) The FDA has seven full-time inspectors at the port of Seattle and three in Tacoma. But the agency was not testing toothpaste until DEG was discovered in Chinese-made toothpaste by Panamanian officials. Muzi.com News 10047977-31 (muzi.com) In late May, the FDA began pulling tubes from U.S. retailers, importers and distributors. Ultimately, 140 samples of Chinese toothpaste were tested, with 38 percent positive for DEG. Muzi.com News 10047977-32 (muzi.com) On June 1, the FDA issued a warning about more than a dozen brands of Chinese-made toothpaste. Muzi.com News 10047977-33 (muzi.com) SpringFresh was not on the initial list, but American Amenities did its own tests and found DEG in some tubes. Company officials declined to release the test results. Muzi.com News 10047977-34 (muzi.com) The FDA looked at SpringFresh in late June, checking samples from 12 tubes, including nine from American Amenities in Washington State and three from Georgia. One Georgia tube was 6 percent DEG -- one of the highest levels seen in the United States, an FDA spokesman said. Muzi.com News 10047977-35 (muzi.com) Even at those levels, the chemical would rarely be deadly. According to an FDA calculation based on 6-ounce tubes of toothpaste that are 3 percent DEG, a 150-pound adult would have to eat more than 175 tubes to receive a fatal dose. A 22-pound child would have to eat 25 tubes. Muzi.com News 10047977-36 (muzi.com) American Amenities rejected a June shipment after testing stock in the U.S. and sending contracted workers to the Chinese manufacturer to check the product at the plant. Muzi.com News 10047977-37 (muzi.com) The company stopped buying SpringFresh. "They're out of the Chinese toothpaste business," said Jesse Lyon, a lawyer acting as American Amenities' spokesman. Muzi.com News 10047977-38 (muzi.com) The company stands to lose at least $100,000 from the recall and associated costs -- a big hit to a business that employs just six people, Lyon said. Muzi.com News 10047977-39 (muzi.com)
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