Censorship + Food Crisis = Catastrophe

Products made with Chinese tainted milk
have spread out to Europe, including Madrid,
where these items were confiscated. (EPA photo)

Thanks to the Chinese authorities obsession with censorship, the milk-tainted scandal has not only exploded in their hands at home, but also the shock waves have spread throughout the world.

Since they learned nothing about their paranoid behavior during the avian flu epidemic a few years ago, they have repeated their very costly mistakes and triggered a food emergency of international proportions.

Reporters Without Borders (TSF) has sent a letter to the Director General of the World Health Organization (WHO) wondering why this UN agency has done nothing but praising "the cooperation it has been receiving from the Chinese authorities in all areas, including its 'regular updates'."

RSF lists the Chinese government's successful efforts that for months kept a very tight lid on a brewing scandal that has left four babies dead, 12,000 hospitalized and 54,000 in need of medical treatment.

How can you accept that the World Health Organisation was not notified until 11 September of the toxicity of these products although information had been circulating since December 2007? As early as last July, He Feng, an investigative journalist with a weekly in southern China, had gathered detailed information on a wave of hospitalisations of babies. But the Chinese government, through the Propaganda Department, imposed a ban on publishing negative information about food scandals before and during the Olympic Games. So He Feng’s editor decided not to publish his information for fear of being punished by the authorities.

Just before the Olympic Games, the Propaganda Department sent a list of 21 banned subjects to the news media. One of them (point 8) was food safety. "All subjects linked to food safety, such as mineral water causing cancer, are off-limits," the directive said.

The authorities have even suppressed a blog entry by Fu Jianfeng, He Feng’s editor, who did not dare publish what they had learned. "I sensed that this was going to be a huge public health disaster," Fu wrote in the censored post.

WHO is ignoring the elephant in the room and, just like the International Olympic Committee during the run-up to the Games, is doing nothing but aggravating the crisis. What are they waiting for to demand answers from the Chinese bosses? Another health or food crisis that really gets out of hand throughout the world?

In its letter, RSF points out exactly where WHO should start mending fences:

To our great regret, the highest authorities in Beijing continue to impose censorship on public health subjects. We urge you to speak out publicly against these repressive and dangerous practices as they are harmful to the health of both Chinese citizens and the population of neighbouring countries.

And countries as far as away as Spain.