Bangladeshis Need to Guard Against Threat of Toxic Food

The Chinese milk powder scandal is nothing new in Bangladesh, where experts believe almost 40% of food produced is contaminated with industry chemicals. Mohammad Aminul Haq inspects a papaya in a central Dhaka food market but soon after picking it up, he returns it to its place on the fruit cart.

"You can tell this has medicine to make it become ripe quicker," the 49-year-old Muslim cleric said of the out-of-season fruit. "It's no good for our health."

Tests this week have confirmed that a brand of milk powder imported into Bangladesh from China was contaminated with the toxic chemical melamine, which has killed four babies in China and sickened more than 53,000.

But Haq said the findings were hardly shocking in a country where health experts say 40 percent of all food is laced with potentially deadly industrial chemicals.

"The government's been very active in testing milk powder imported from China, but they are not paying attention to other tainted products," Haq said.

"There are much worse chemicals than melamine -deadly poisonous chemicals -in our food and drinks."

Bangladeshi authorities have banned some brands of Chinese milk powder in the wake of the health scare, but Shah Mafuzur Rahman, from the Institute of Public Health, said Bangladeshis are regularly exposed to contaminated food.

"Around 40 percent of the food we eat day-to-day is tainted by various chemicals and industrial dyes," he told AFP.