No melamine in 10 more products tested
KUALA LUMPUR:
Ten more products taken off shelves of supermarkets and shops at random nationwide to be tested for Melamine, returned negative results, and that augers well for consumers, said Deputy Health Minister Datuk Dr Abdul Latiff Ahmad. “Since we have enough officers, we operate 24 hours a day and do a lot of sampling. So far, there are no products identified and that means all the products tested are safe,” he told reporters after opening the Health Ministry’s National Innovation Awards at the Serdang Hospital near hear yesterday. The public need not be worried as the Government was taking every necessary step to ensure transparency in the testing process. “If there was a case of Melamine found in any product, the Health Ministry Director-General will make it public. We will not hide any details,” he said. Since the Melamine in milk scandal rocked China and the whole world last month, the Ministry had taken pro-active measures to analyse all food products imported from China. “Yesterday we tested 10 products and all conformed to permissible amount of 1 mg/kg for baby food and 2.5 mg/kg for others. A directive from the European Commission had said that up to 30 parts per million (ppm) of the substance in products was still safe. Abdul Latiff added that the issue was also raised at the ASEAN Health Ministers’ meeting which was attended by China’s Health Minister who omise that there would be no compromise in efforts to combat the problem. Speaking of the awards, Abdul Latiff urged all new innovations from the Ministry’s staff to be patented, even if it did not win any prizes, so as to safeguard their invention from being duplicated. - Bernama
