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WHO sets tolerable levels for melamine in food
05 Dec 2008 20:54:54 GMT
 Source: Reuters
OTTAWA, Dec 5 (Reuters) - International experts said on Friday they had set a tolerable daily intake for melamine, an industrial chemical found in tainted Chinese milk, soy and pet food products and linked to the deaths of at least six babies.

It is not yet possible to set a "safe" level of the chemical, the experts told a meeting in Ottawa sponsored by the World Health Organization.

But it is possible to say people can eat or drink 0.2 mg per kg (2.2 pounds) of body weight, they said.

Based on this, a 110 pound (50 kg) person could tolerate up to 10 mg of melamine per day.

"We expect this could better guide the authorities in protecting the health of their public," WHO Director for Food Safety Jorgen Schlundt said in a statement.

Melamine-tainted Chinese milk has killed at least six infants and made close to 300,000 sick.

Melamine, an industrial compound used to make plastics and pesticides, was added to watered-down milk because it mimics protein in quality tests.

The tolerable daily intake of cyanuric acid, a related chemical, is 1.5 mg per kilogram of body weight. The groups said when both chemicals are in food the effect seems to be more than merely additive.

In November the U.S. Food and Drug Administration found that levels of melamine below 1 part per million, as found in baby formula in the United States, were safe.

Schlundt agreed these levels provided a sufficient margin of safety.

Melamine-contaminated pet food that surfaced last year in the Unites States caused harmful crystals that either damaged or shut down the kidneys of dogs and cats, and the FDA assumes that is the same issue with the infant cases in China.

European Union regulators banned imports of Chinese soy-based food products for infants and young children this week after melamine was found in Chinese soybean meal. (Reporting by Maggie Fox; Editing by Anthony Boadle)


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