China Rejects Tainted Food, Cosmetics Imports - State Media

BEIJING (AFP)--China said it had rejected over 2,700 batches of tainted imported food and cosmetics in the first seven months of the year, state media reported Thursday, as it coped with its own food safety issues.

The products included batches of baby milk formula made by Australian firm Ausnutria that were found to contain a potentially deadly bacterium, the official China Daily reported, quoting the country's quality watchdog.

The bacterium, Enterobacter sakazakii, can cause fatal infections in infants, but the newspaper said no such cases had been reported in China.

Ausnutria was not immediately available for comment.

China is in the midst of its own food scandal after an industrial chemical called melamine was discovered in milk made by 22 Chinese companies and then in eggs.

The tainted milk has killed four infants so far, and sickened at least 53,000.

But dairy products imported from the United States were also found to have quality issues, the report said.

These included more than 4,300 pounds of six kinds of cheeses that were found to contain too many coliform bacteria - the commonly-used bacterial indicator of the sanitary quality of foods - according to the China Daily.