Raw milk providers blamed for deaths of Chinese children

Phoenix News.Net
Monday 13th October, 2008

The Bright Dairy company in China, which has been embroiled in the melamine milk taint scandal, has claimed milk collection stations that bought milk from farmers were to blame for the problem.

Bright Dairy has said it was a victim of unscrupulous behavior by independent providers who supplied it with raw milk.

The president of Bright Dairy appeared on television on the weekend to make a statement in the hope of restoring consumer confidence.

Guo Benheng said: 'I'd say we made an innocent mistake, although an innocent mistake is still a mistake. We are definitely making corrections.'

Milk collection stations and individual farmers are accused of watering down milk to increase volume, then adding the industrial chemical melamine to increase protein levels.

Melamine is used mainly in plastics and fertilizer.

The addition of melamine to Chinese milk caused the deaths of four infants and made 54,000 other children very ill.

Some children are still in hospital with serious kidney problems.

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