Dangerous Melamine Might Have Entered Croatia

A prohibited amount of melamine has been found in Snickers, Mars, Kit Kat, M&Ms and Lipton tea, which are sold in Croatia.

Milk, Snickers, Mars, Kit Kat, M&Ms and Lipton tea are some of the products that have been found to contain prohibited amounts of melamine. These products can be found on Croatian shelves, but the Croatian Institute for Public Health does not believe that Croatian consumers are at danger from melamine.

“According to our information, for now there is no danger of the appearance of melamine in Croatia, but it is always possible that manufacturers that have their headquarters in the West, and that acquire raw materials from the East, can bring melamine into Croatia” says Krunoslav Capak, the head of the service for health ecology in the Croatian Institute for Public Health.

He says that even the appearance of small amounts of melamine would not be too dangerous, because it is mainly smaller children with more sensitive bodies than adults that get sick from melamine.

Melamine in food was first discovered in China where four children died from consuming milk with added melamine. It is estimated that around 90 thousand children get sick from increased concentrations of melamine in food, on the basis of powdered milk. Later it was determined that melamine was intentionally added to milk in underground factories, which was then sold to farms and stations that buy milk.

 Suppliers of milk added melamine to watered down milk in order to cheat on quality tests, because that chemical registers as a protein.

The increased concentration of melamine was found in 31 products, which all originated in a total of 20 Chinese factories.

Hungary recalled peanuts with cheese from their shelves

The next country to find food with an increased concentration of melamine is the Netherlands, which banned biscuits by the “Koala” brand, which is from China. The English-Dutch food giant Unilever pulled their “Lipton” tea with powdered milk from the shelves in Hong Kong and Macao, after which it was determined that it contained traces of the industrial chemical melamine.

The North Korean institute for food and drugs reported that melamine was found in the chocolates M&Ms, Snickers and Fun size by the Mars company, and in the chocolates Kit Kat from Nestle, made in China.

Hungary has recalled snacks with peanuts with cheese that were contaminated with melamine. The snacks were purchased in China by P-Nut Crackers Chips Snack World, and contained 19.9 mg of melamine per kilogram, whilst in Hungary the allowed amount of melamine is 2.5 mg per kilogram.

Melamine is a synthetic chemical compound that is used in various industries of plastic masses and lacquers, cleaning agents, as an addition to plant supplements, and for the production of pesticides. Melamine is not something that can be found in nature, and is not allowed to be added to food, and it is dangerous because it can cause the kidneys to stop functioning.