Buyer Beware: Toothpaste Now, What's Next?

Over a week ago I suggested the combination of America's Bush gutted FDA and China's quick study of substituting low cost ingredients to maximize profits would be dangerous to consumers, a recipe for disaster. What happened since?

The Food and Drug Administration is now testing Chinese toothpaste for a poisonous ingredient used in anti-freeze. It found product on shelves in Miami with the toxic ingredient. This follows poisonous dog and cat food where the manufacturers conducted a huge recall.

The news reported no recall in the toothpaste case, but the FDA did suggest consumers throw away low priced toothpaste made in China. Bargain retail stores frequently sell the product under a variety of brand names.

The chemical is diethylene glycol. “It does not belong in toothpaste even in small concentrations,” said the FDA’s Deborah M. Autor.

How did the Chinese react? Let's just say they haven't studied the Tylenol case often used as a model for ensuring product safety while maintaining customer loyalty.

Calling the FDA warning "unscientific, irresponsible and contradictory," China's General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine said in a statement posted on its Web site late Saturday that low levels of the chemical have been deemed safe for consumption.

It also said European Union standards allow for a certain amount of the chemical and cited a 2000 Chinese study that found toothpaste containing less than 15.6 percent diethylene glycol was not harmful.

I hate to tell China, but we aren't the European Union and I don't particularly trust a country's science when a not long ago news story reported a handful of people died in a Chinese hospital from drinking the water.

Given the Bush administration's disdain for telling corporations to do anything other than make boatloads of money (and send some of that to Republicans) and China's new obsession with the profit motive, it's back to buyer beware in America.

The Peace dividend is long gone, food safety is now up in the air, the country struggles with widespread illegal immigration; is it 1917 instead of 2007?

China U.S. Trade a Recipe for Disaster

Expect a new round of dangerous products from the Economic Red Storm. Poisonous animal food morphed into toxic toothpaste courtesy of Chinese manufacturers. So what are both sides doing about it? Not much.

Neither side of the China U.S. trade situation plans to step up efforts to ensure safe products reach shelves in North America. The Bush administration's gutting of the Food and Drug Administration is compounded by his preference for voluntary measures. How did China respond to Treasury Chief Hank Paulson's concerns? They assured us "they would fully investigate any problems uncovered." If they're only examining problems post production, the consumer is in trouble.

As Dr. W. Edwards Deming stated "You cannot inspect in quality." Neither side has any clue as how to achieve quality or as the guru called for by the end of his career, transformation of management.

But apparently Communists understand the profit motive quite well. Just as American corporate chiefs cut costs and jobs to maximize returns, the Chinese substituted toxic ingredients to cut costs and boost margins. Pet food, toothpaste, what's next? The FDA will find out when American consumers tell them. Unfortunately neither side plans to do anything other than shut the barn door after the cows get out...