Things produced in one place can be repackaged and sold in several places. Quite awhile ago antifreeze was sold as glycerin. By the time barrels of the product ended up in Panama it was simply labeled glycerin, no origin, and was used for children's cough syrup, and as you can imagine, quite a few of them died.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/06/world/americas/06poison.htmlMay 6, 2007
From China to Panama, a Trail of Poisoned Medicine
By WALT BOGDANICH and JAKE HOOKER
The kidneys fail first. Then the central nervous system begins to misfire. Paralysis spreads, making breathing difficult, then often impossible without assistance. In the end, most victims die.bMany of them are children, poisoned at the hands of their unsuspecting parents.
The syrupy poison, diethylene glycol, is an indispensable part of the modern world, an industrial solvent and prime ingredient in some antifreeze. It is also a killer. And the deaths, if not intentional, are often no accident. Over the years, the poison has been loaded into all varieties of medicine — cough syrup, fever medication, injectable drugs — a result of counterfeiters who profit by substituting the sweet-tasting solvent for a safe, more expensive syrup, usually glycerin, commonly used in drugs, food, toothpaste and other products.
Toxic syrup has figured in at least eight mass poisonings around the world in the past two decades. Researchers estimate that thousands have died. In many cases, the precise origin of the poison has never been determined. But records and interviews show that in three of the last four cases it was made in China, a major source of counterfeit drugs. <snip>
The counterfeit glycerin passed through three trading companies on three continents, yet not one of them tested the syrup to confirm what was on the label. Along the way, a certificate falsely attesting to the purity of the shipment was repeatedly altered, eliminating the name of the manufacturer and previous owner. As a result, traders bought the syrup without knowing where it came from, or who made it. With this information, the traders might have discovered — as The Times did — that the manufacturer was not certified to make pharmaceutical ingredients. <snip>
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I googled "Food ingredients from China" just now and came up with this LA Times Business section article. It's well worth reading the whole thing.
http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-chinafood18may18,0,2166175.storyChina's additives on menu in U.S.
It is the leading supplier of many ingredients in packaged food. Barring the imports is difficult.
By Don Lee
Times Staff Writer
May 18, 2007
SHANGHAI — As the recall of tainted pet food mushroomed into an international scandal, two of the largest U.S. food manufacturers put out a blanket order to their American suppliers: No more ingredients from China. The directive from Mission Foods Corp. and Tyson Foods Inc., made quietly this month, underscored consumers' and manufacturers' fears about the safety of imported food ingredients after contaminated wheat products from China killed and sickened cats and dogs in the United States. The problem is, what Mission and Tyson want is next to impossible.
In the last decade, China has become the world's leading supplier of many food flavorings, vitamins and preservatives. Like fingernail clippers, playing cards, Christmas ornaments and other items, some food additives are available in vast quantities only from China. China exported $2.5 billion of food ingredients to the United States and the rest of the world in 2006, an increase of 150% from just two years earlier, according to Chinese industry estimates. It is now the predominant maker of vanilla flavoring, citric acid and varieties of vitamin B such as thiamine, riboflavin and folic acid — nutrients commonly added to processed flour goods such as Mission tortillas and Tyson breaded chicken. <snip>
China's overall food safety record is poor. Use of chemical fertilizers and toxic pesticides is heavy. Fraud and corruption often thwart what lax controls exist. In recent years, U.S. officials have issued alerts about Chinese honey tainted with a harmful antibiotic; Chinese candy containing sulfites that can cause fatal allergic reactions; and infant formula missing vital nutrients, which in China left a dozen babies dead in 2004. A small group of large manufacturers dominate the production of food ingredients in China, but hundreds if not thousands of small, virtually anonymous businesses — such as the two linked to the pet-food scandal — operate in an industry lacking tough standards and enforcement. <snip>
A small group of large manufacturers dominate the production of food ingredients in China, but hundreds if not thousands of small, virtually anonymous businesses — such as the two linked to the pet-food scandal — operate in an industry lacking tough standards and enforcement. <snip>
Many packaged foods contain dozens of items from around the world, acquired through complex networks of traders and brokers, before they get processed at manufacturing plants where companies have more direct oversight. Chinese-made ingredients are probably found in every aisle of American supermarkets. Consider that American favorite, the Hostess Twinkie. Of its 39 ingredients, at least half a dozen — such as vitamin B compounds, the preservative sorbic acid and red and yellow colorings — are most likely made in China, says Steve Ettlinger, author of the book, "Twinkie, Deconstructed." In an interview from New York, Ettlinger said he couldn't be sure where Interstate Bakeries Corp., the maker of Twinkies, obtained those ingredients. The Kansas City, Mo., company wouldn't help him with his research, he said, and food makers rarely list the origin of individual ingredients on packages. Nor do they necessarily want to know where it all comes from. <snip>
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