from http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/apr/11/china-nitrite-poisoning-milk-intentional
In a separate report on Monday, the China Daily said authorities in the central province of Henan had detained 95 people involved in a profit-seeking tainted pork scandal. The detainees allegedly made, sold or used pig feed laced with clenbuterol, a banned drug that causes pigs to convert fat to muscle quickly.
Clenbuterol is illegal because it can cause nausea, dizziness, headaches and heart palpitations in humans, but pig farmers like to use it because it helps yield more lean meat, which is costlier than fatty meat.
The investigation was launched after tainted pork was found being sold by Shuanghui Group, China's largest meat processor. Authorities traced the contamination back to an illegal chemical factory that sold raw clenbuterol to middlemen who mixed it with starch and resold it to farmers, who mixed it into their feed, it said.
Authorities found 18 tonnes of clenbuterol-tainted feed in Henan, and a random check of nine farms in the province found that 52 out of 1,512 pigs tested positive for the drug.
In a separate report on Monday, the China Daily said authorities in the central province of Henan had detained 95 people involved in a profit-seeking tainted pork scandal. The detainees allegedly made, sold or used pig feed laced with clenbuterol, a banned drug that causes pigs to convert fat to muscle quickly.
Clenbuterol is illegal because it can cause nausea, dizziness, headaches and heart palpitations in humans, but pig farmers like to use it because it helps yield more lean meat, which is costlier than fatty meat.
The investigation was launched after tainted pork was found being sold by Shuanghui Group, China's largest meat processor. Authorities traced the contamination back to an illegal chemical factory that sold raw clenbuterol to middlemen who mixed it with starch and resold it to farmers, who mixed it into their feed, it said.
Authorities found 18 tonnes of clenbuterol-tainted feed in Henan, and a random check of nine farms in the province found that 52 out of 1,512 pigs tested positive for the drug.
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