BEIJING — The industrial chemical melamine is commonly added to animal feed in China to fake higher protein levels, state media reported Thursday, offering what appeared to be a tacit admission by the government that the food supply could be rife with contamination.
The Nanfang Daily said it was an “open secret” that melamine scrap is being repackaged into an inexpensive product called “protein powder” that is sold to food suppliers.
The websites of the official Xinhua News Agency and the Communist Party’s main newspaper, the People’s Daily, also carried the story in a rare step of publicizing information that reflects poorly on the country.
Health experts say ingesting a small amount of melamine poses no danger, but in larger doses it can cause kidney stones and kidney failure.
