SHIJIAZHUANG - More than a 1,000 parents anxious over tainted milk powder on Thursday rushed their infants to hospitals for health checks as the government announced that a fourth baby had died in the spreading scandal.
Meanwhile, regulators in Hong Kong ordered the recall of milk products from a Chinese dairy after finding the banned industrial chemical melamine in eight of 30 sample products tested.
Police in Hebei province said they had arrested 12 more people Thursday, bringing the total to 18. Shi Guizhong, spokesman for the provincial police, said six allegedly sold melamine, while the other 12 were milk suppliers accused of adding the chemical to milk.
The official Xinhua News Agency said the latest death was a baby in the far western region of Xinjiang. However, an official at the No. 2 Agriculture and Production Corps. Hospital in Yanqi, Xinjiang, said it was too early to say if the 8-month-old baby died of complications caused by the tainted milk powder.
Shi said Hebei police and government officials were starting a 10-day campaign to focus on melamine contamination. Suppliers to the dairy companies are believed to have added the banned chemical, normally used in plastics, to watered-down milk to make it appear higher in protein.
Police also confiscated 660 pounds of suspected chemicals, including 490 pounds of melamine, he said. An additional 87 people were summoned for questioning and 28 people have been detained, according to Shijiazhuang Vice Mayor Zhang Meizhi.
One suspect, surnamed Su, told police that from February 2007 to July 2008 he bought 200 44-pound sacks of melamine $29 each, and sold them all to milk suppliers, Shi told a news conference.
At the Beijing Children’s Hospital Thursday, more than 1,000 anxious parents waited for check ups as they carried their sleeping infants and toddlers. By 2 p.m, doctors had seen only half of the 1,200 who waited in line.
Nervous parents said their children had all been drinking three major brands of baby milk powder, all of which have been recalled after government tests found melamine.
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