http://www.macon.com/267/story/471279.html
23 September 2008
China Tries To Reassure Public Over Milk Scare
http://sg.news.yahoo.com/afp/20080924/tts-china-food-safety-child-a73cdd6.html
Yahoo! News
27 September 2008
All of us would have known about the China Milk Scandal by now. Currently, we are still affected by its repercussions. What exactly constitutes to the scandal?
One of the major factors is the failure and flaw of group communications. Different bodies failed to communicate with one another effectively.
“Chinese state television reported that the company at the center of the scandal, Sanlu Group Co., received complaints about tainted formula beginning last December and waited eight months to tell the local government, which then waited another month before informing higher authorities."
This went on for 9 months! Imagine the number of people who would be affected in these 9 months?
A baby suffering from kidney stones after drinking tainted milk.
From: China Photos/Getty Images
Looking at the Sanlu Group Co., why did it withhold the information for eight months? It is probably due to the fact that the Olympics is going to be hosted and they want to wait till it is over before disclosing the scandal. It might be that they were afraid to report it to the upper authorities. Many possibilities exist.
Let us focus on the Chinese government itself. They have received the news during the period of Olympics but chose not to disclose the news so as not to affect the Olympics. Their selfish choice of action is a good example of groupthink. They are a group of like-minded individuals governing the country. When they were faced with the problem, even if someone who opposed to the idea of not disclosing the scandal would not do so as he/she will not want to face dissension. Thus, it leads to even more problems for the Chinese government. People lose faith in milk and the honesty of the government. Moreover, so many lives were at stake. 53,000 children were sickened. Is this what a government would do for its people?
People wait for their children to be tested for kidney stones.
From: China Photos/Getty Images
I feel that a huge body like the government should adopt better policies. Even though certain news should be censored, it should not be something that affects the lives of the people, especially when it can be prevented. Had the Chinese government disclose it earlier, the number of sickened children would have been drastically less.
9 comments:
i have to say i am very disgusted by what China has ALWAYS been doing. first, it was SARS. it has been found out that China was hiding that matter for some time too before the world came to know about it. then now, the tainted milk shit came to light, FINALLY.
you said there are many possibilities for that, but i say they are just purely unethical. they want to earn big bucks, they want their country to make a name in the industry, they want to be successful and proud of themselves, as simply as that. i must say i am rather embarrassed to be chinese since my ancestors "supposedly" come from China. by keeping these incidents mum, they are being selfish bastards because look at the lives which were lost in the SARS and the milk incident. it is no wonder China nationals face discrimination from locals, they should jolly well know why.
in all the pursuit of wealth, unscrupulous merchants no doubt exist. what is infuriating, is the way the chinese government tried to cover up the scandal before it grew too large. with such a huge population at stake and affecting the future generations, it is really disheartening too hear that they have hidden the news for so damn long. i agree with you that it was due to the olympics, with national pride and glory at stake, but how can lives be compared to those?
what you mentioned about groupthink is very true too, even if there were some lower ranking officials who deemed it necessary to broadcast the news, they might have been forced to go with the higher orders. sad case isn't it.
a world superpower just by taking space walks and hosting the olympics? china has certainly got to clean up its own yard first before proclaiming to the world that it is here to be so.
undeniable, the inconsiderate acts of the various department caused harm to the innocent people. all of us can understand the significance of the Olympics to the chinese but isn't the lives of the people more important than anyhting else? in addition to the harm caused to the chinese, the negative effects also spread to other countries including Singapore.
probably like what is mentioned in Kai Siang's comment that it's the alike thinking of the various group that leads them to not dislose the news to the public and teh failure of not disclosing, as seen here leads to distrust and even hatred from the people because the ties between the government and the public works in a similar way as that of a couple. one need to disclose to let the other understand and thus balance the realtionship. the Chinese governemnt choice of keeping the news to themselves toppled their realtionship with the public and i believed that gaining the trust of the people will never be easy.
hmm... I guess that scandals like these can seldom be hidden for long? And the fact that they keep appearing shows that there may be some problems in the food production industry in China.
And also, I think that this scandal will continue until China takes action to correct the error once and for all, including the food-related scams exposed in the past few years.
Corrupt governments. Two words that explain this situation. They just simply did not care, nor could be particularly bothered to solve this dilemma. I can't believe such people exist, but hey, it's right in front of my eyes now! To think that this is coming from the country whose economy will be undisputedly the most powerful by the time the next 20 years are over. Hopefully they would have improved their level of human decency and compassion by then so as to truly portray China as a credible first-world country thriving in its success in every way - both economically and morally.
it is really unethical of them. Such selfish thoughts have affected large areas of the world. Babies are the most innocent victims of this issue.
Even though the Olympics was a glorious event for the chinese, i feel that at this point of time everything has gone to drain. They cover up the news for the sake of a smooth sailing Olympics event.
I think they are just shallow people who make people lose trust in them.Angered and disturbed by their selfish actions. Trust them to actually poison food that will go into people's mouth?!
I agree with the point you made that China should adopt better policies. In my view, I feel that China is really selfish and I think that China should have disclosed the matter during the olympics as this incident concerns the lives of more than a million babies. So what if China had been successful in the Olympics? The incident had tarnished her reputation of being a leading country in the world.
Personally, I view the life of others as more important than making a name in the industry. I feel that China does not deserve the honour of a leading country and that she should do something to solve her problems.
Here we can see that the Chinese Government intervening in the mass media and blocking the spreading of the news of the "Tainted Milk Scandal".
While the world rejoiced in the Olympic Festival, the Chinese Government could have been plotting a timescale to release this news.
We see how dangerous manipulation of the mass media is in this case. For the backlash that accompanied this news was unprecedented as consumers all over the world felt deceived and made a fool of.
china china china.. sigh.
Disappointment once again. There are many rumors on the net about how their food products are unsafe etc etc.
horrible and totally unethical acts. When can they wake up from their filled-with-making-money mind??
yijing
Post a Comment