According to an Associated Press article published over the weekend, the FDA is going back on its previous statement that melamine contamination would not be tolerated in infant and baby formula sold in the United States. Now it appears that, despite sharing any evidence of studies supporting the safety of their decision, the FDA is allowing 1 part per million of melamine in baby formula sold in the United States so long as it doesn’t also include cyanuric acid, which combines with melamine to form melamine cyanurate.
Back when the only baby formulas being contaminated were Chinese brands and only thousands of Chinese babies were sick or dying, officials in the United States thought it was appalling that officials in China had allowed such contamination to go on. Now that traces of melamine have been found in big US brands like Similac, Enfamil and Nestle the FDA seems to be changing its story. Perhaps they’ve been visited by the holiday Lobby Elves?
Regardless of what the FDA or any other organization deems as “safe” we’d like to know What Reason is There to Put Melamine in Baby Formula in the First Place? Melamine is used to make plastics, cleaning products, glues and flame retardants. The ONLY reason to put it in food is to fool testers into thinking a food product has more protein than it really has. This begs the question: Why would we even a have 1 part per million ratio of melamine to other ingredients in ANY food product sold in the United States – let alone the formula we feed to our babies!
Related article on The Daily Green: FDA Declares Melamine Safe in Baby Formula
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