- The disgraced head of China's food and drug agency was
sentenced to death today amid a wave of consumer safety scandals that have
rippled across the world.
-
- Zheng Xiaoyu was found guilty of accepting 6.5m yuan
(£433,000) worth of bribes from pharmaceutical companies to expedite
the approval of new drugs.
-
- Underscoring the state's determination to crackdown on
corruption and consumer safety violations, he is the most senior official
to receive the death penalty in seven years.
-
- The government fears a collapse of consumer confidence
after a series of deadly food and drug scandals, often linked with lax
regulation and bribe taking. With more and more Chinese products filling
shelves overseas, several cases have had international repercussions.
-
- For most of the past decade, Zheng was the face of the
government's consumer safety policy. A former pharmaceutical company executive,
he was appointed the first director of the state food and drug administration
when it was established in 1998.
-
- His powerful agency controlled the approval process for
all new drugs and was supposed to coordinate the licensing of food and
pharmaceutical factories.
-
- According to local media, one antibiotic approved by
the agency killed 10 patients last year before it was withdrawn. In 2005
- the year Zheng was arrested - the health ministry reported 34,000 food-related
illnesses.
-
- Given China's 1.3 billion population, this is not a huge
number. The Beijing No 1 intermediate people's court said Zheng's main
crime was to have abused his position to secure benefits for himself and
his familiy.
-
- "Zheng was supposed to use the power given to him
by the state and the people seriously and honestly, but instead he has
ignored their vital interests by taking the bribes," the Xinhua news
agency quoted the court as saying. "This has threatened the safety
of people's life and health and has caused an extremely bad social impact."
-
- The unusually harsh penalty may have been handed down
to reassure foreign as well as Chinese consumers that the government is
taking action.
-
- Earlier this month, Australia, Panama and the Dominican
Republic recalled thousands of tubes of Chinese-made toothpaste that allegedly
contained dangerous levels of diethylene glycol, a toxin normally used
to cool engines.
-
- In April, the US government blamed tainted pet food from
China for the fatal poisoning of several dogs and cats. Three US states
have since banned imports of catfish from China because they contained
an unauthorised antibiotic.
-
- Copyright Guardian News and Media Limited
-
-
|