Composed of nitrogen, carbon, and hydrogen, melamine, when combined with formaldehyde and exposed to extreme heat and then cooled, results in a moldable plastic dish wares or containers that are hard, almost unbreakable and dishwasher-safe. Added to milk, which was diluted with water, to create more volume for greater financial profit, this substance induces kidney stone formation, over weeks and months, leads to renal failure, and, in many cases, to death.

It is obvious that milk, as a food item, is not a regulated item and did not have to go through scientific screening and approval in China, otherwise this poison could have been detected prior to manufacture and distribution, and serious ailments and deaths prevented.

But it is not only in China where milk is exempt from such rigid scrutiny by a government agency. In the United States and in the Philippines, milk and other items, juices, pills, herbals, etc., which the manufacturers claim as "food supplements" (in spite of the fact that most of them are advertised by inference as "a cure for" or "effective for" various illnesses), are exempt as "non-drugs" from the stringent regulatory mandate of the US-FDA or the Philippine BFAD which only covers drugs and medications, prior to production. In this regard, the government is glaringly powerless and impotent in safeguarding the consumers…until a catastrophe like the recent vegetable e. coli outbreak in the USA, or this chemical contamination in China happens. By then, the harm is done, and people, ill or dead.

Folk remedies are our earthly natural gifts, and traditional plant and herbs are still man’s sources for about 85 percent of the world’s developing nations. Some of the problems with herbals drugs include lack of quality control, contamination with adulterants and bacteria.

There is no question that many plants, fungi, flowers, roots, leaves, fruits have chemical substances in them that could be beneficial to the human body, not only as a source of nutrition but as herbal items with medicinal values. Modern science has harnessed some of them, reconfigured their molecular structures and properties, and transformed them into standard-safe and effective medicines. Penicillin is one of the multitudes of drugs that have their origin from these natural elements.

The quest for alternative medicine, driven by culture, tradition, or economics, has been tainted today by the incursion of some pharmaceutical or manufacturing companies, which have flooded the market with a hundreds of "herbal medications and juices," each with the preposterous claim or insinuation that their products are useful or good for all diseases, from acne to athlete’s foot, from high blood pressure to diabetes, from impotence to ageing, from arthritis to cancer, etc. They obviously aim to deceive the unsuspecting public into believing their product is a cure for any and all diseases known to man. And since this particular business is today a multi-billion dollar industry, it goes without saying that there are millions upon millions of ignorant consumers that are being victimized daily by these unscrupulous entrepreneurs.

While these companies are spending millions of dollars in marketing and promotion, they are raking in billions of dollars a year, by peddling their products, under the guise of the label "food supplement," in order to escape the strict scrutiny and investigation by the US Food and Drug Administration or similar governmental agencies in other countries, for safety, efficacy, proper dosage, contraindication, short and long-term side effects, etc.

Most herbal products today have not been scientifically investigated the same way all western drugs on the market have been studied and tested. So, we do not really know which are safe and efficacious, and what side-effects they may have in the long run. Not all herbal medicines are dangerous but a quite a few have been shown to cause kidney failure, liver failure, cancer, clot blockages in the kidney veins, seizures, etc. Some of them have caused deaths.

Agencies like the US-FDA and Philippine BFAD, through the legislature, must, in my opinion as a consumer and, especially, as a physician, critique and re-evaluate their current authority, scope, and role, in general, to fully protect the health and welfare of the public. The China incident, where the responsible heads must roll, is a case in point, a compelling reason, why these agencies around the world must revisit the issue to better serve their citizens.

I realize that this issue of oversight is a complex and expensive one. I also believe that the less government intrusion in the people’s life, the better for the people and the country. However, the great advances in modern medicine today would be useless if not harnessed to the fullest for the benefit of mankind. Scientific truth must prevail for the people’s good, even if it hurts some business companies. After all, health and life are priceless and irreplaceable commodities. And we do not want any merchant of harm or death in our society.

At this time, it would be prudent to avoid milk and milk products made in China, or from other countries in question, whoever the distributor might be, until the final official verdict is in.

As always, it is wise to read the labels on canned or package food items, use only US-FDA and BFAD approved medications, and to stay away from "food supplements."

Nothing beats breast milk for babies, and a healthy lifestyle of safe nutritious diet, daily exercise, light alcohol intake, abstinence from tobacco, and a regular medical and dental checkup for all of us