Made in China

There’s been a lot of “made in China” problems lately.

First there was the pet food recall which was later discovered to be caused by contaminated wheat gluten exported from China.

Then there was the toothpaste recall where the FDA found several major brands of toothpaste that were made in China to contain diethylene glycol, a chemical used in antifreeze.

Today the Consumer Product Safety Commision is announcing a recall of 1.5 million children’s toys made in China that contain lead.

In all of these recall cases it would be hard to accept that the contaminants got into these products purely by “mistake.” The scale at which these recalls were issued was too large to have been isolated to a single batch of products–these occured across many batches over a significant period of time.

I wonder what’s going to be next.

Update 7/1/07: Made in China Flip-flops sold at Wal-Mart cause severe skin irritations.

Update 7/17/07: 100 people die in Panama after using tainted Made in China cough syrup.

Update 7/20/07: China shuts down 3 factories in response to product safety problems.

Update 8/14/07: Mattel Toys recalls millions of toys that were Made in China and contained lead paint.

Update 8/18/07: Toys R Us recalls bibs that were Made in China and contained lead.

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