DAMN!!! They're poisoning us AGAIN!

[KansDem]

Tainted heparin threat widens

10 countries find agent suspected in U.S. deaths

By Jonathan D. Rockoff

Sun Reporter

April 22, 2008

WASHINGTON

A contaminated blood thinner from China suspected in dozens of U.S. deaths has now become a worldwide public health problem, with 10 other countries detecting the often-toxic ingredient, federal investigators said yesterday.

The compound, which in tests mimics the real blood thinner heparin but costs less to make, may have been added deliberately somewhere along a production chain that began on farms in China, beyond the reach of U.S. regulators.

Food and Drug Administration officials also announced a major scientific breakthrough in their attempt to understand how patients got sick from the contaminated heparin. In addition, the agency stepped up its enforcement actions against a facility in China that supplied the medication for the U.S. market. And officials raised the possible death toll from 62 to 81.

The rapid developments came on the eve of a congressional hearing expected to show that the FDA lacks the resources to carry out adequate inspection of thousands of foreign facilities now producing a significant share of the medications consumed here.

--more--
Baltomore Sun

How long until we apologize to the Chinese government?

edited to fix link...

[onehandle]

1. Ban Chinese Imports!

Incoming Democratic President, remove their "most favored trade status."

[DCKit]

12. How much longer will they be able to afford to ship their stuff to us?

Granted, shipping by sea is the least expensive, but we're coming up on the break-even point - especially since American consumers can already barely afford to buy food and gas.

[islandmkl]

2. it's the fault of the person taking the drug, apparently...

the Chinese are just making a buck, so it's 'all okay' business-wise...

more of same from the 'scaled-down' government of the neocons..

[AndyA]

3. Meanwhile, the Chinese are driving big American SUVs and paying

$2.90/gallon because the government regulates the price of gas.

Keep shopping at Wal-Mart, America. You're literally killing yourselves by doing so. If you want to see what a fool looks like, just pay attention to the people driving FOREIGN CARS turning into a Wal-Mart store so they can buy FOREIGN crap cheap.

And they think they're saving money. FOOLS! What little they save is being put into their gas tank. Keep it up, America, you're shopping yourselves out of jobs and you're too stupid to figure it out.

But, American Idol is still on, so all's well, right? :eyes:

[KansDem]

4. What's more they're getting GM's first hybrids!

General Motors plans first hybrid car sales in China

3 days ago

BEIJING (AP) — General Motors Corp. will sell its first gas-electric hybrid cars in China in July, introducing a model created in part by GM's Shanghai design center, the company said Saturday.

The Buick LaCrosse will be the second hybrid to enter the Chinese automobile market following Toyota Motor Corp.'s Prius in early 2006.

The LaCrosse is due to be unveiled Sunday at the Beijing auto show, GM managers said. They said it would be priced under 300,000 yuan ($43,000; 27,000 euros) — comparable to the Prius.

"We don't expect to see a very high volume of sales of this car in China in a short period of time. But we bring this technology to help China support sustainable growth and bring consumers in that direction," Joseph Liu, GM China's vice president for sales, told reporters.

--more--
AP

So what do we Americans do? Continue driving fuel-inefficient automobiles while gas prices soar? :silly:

[kestrel91316]

5. We have known about the heparin contamination for month or more

here in the trenches. Sigh. They recalled the lot that I have a bottle of, and now I CANNOT get ANY replacement. Period.

I told my distributor rep I wasn't returning the bottle - that I was holding it in reserve for emergency needs until they could supply new product. I have to be able to heparinize an intravenous catheter when I cap it off for the night. No exceptions. She said that's what everybody else is doing, too. (We don't have any reports of problems with its use in animals that I know of. The problem in people was with therapeutic doses orders of magnitude greater than what we use to heparinize a catheter.

[mopinko]

6. with all the drug companies in this country, why the hell are we importing

ANYTHING from china.

[progressoid]

10. $$$

[mopinko]

11. yeah, i know. but

with the bucks they are pulling in on those drugs- geez. it's not like we are talking walmart coffee cups, here.

[femrap]

7. Can't offend those that

OWN US!! They could sell all of our Treasuries and then what?

The US is headed for 3rd World status.

[nichomachus]

8. Typical heparin factory in China

Actually, this is one of the cleaner ones -- notice the "clean room" conditions,

[Indenturedebtor]

9. They're not poisoning us

It's OUR government and the companies that own it that are poisoning us.