The Department of Health said yesterday that the latest spot checks on 43 beef products at supermarkets in various parts of the country discovered nine violations where beef imported from the US and Canada was tainted with Paylean.
Since last Friday, when the news broke that beef imported from the US was found to contain traces of Paylean, an agent that promotes the production of lean meat in cattle, health officials across the country began conducting checks on various types of meat sold in supermarkets and at traditional markets.
Paylean contains ractopamine, one of four animal feed additives — along with salbutamol, terbutaline and clenbuterol — that are banned in Taiwan.
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced that eight out of 27 US beef products tested positive for traces of ractopamine, with amounts between 0.48 parts per billion (ppb) to 5.62ppb. One of three beef products tested from Canada was also positive for the harmful chemical at 0.8ppb, while the rest of the beef tested by officials — which was from Australia, New Zealand, Panama and Nicaragua — was not found to be chemically enhanced.
The FDA said that one US beef product contained as much as 5.62ppb — roughly two times as much as the levels discovered in a beef product discovered last week. The beef was on sale at Pxmart (全聯實業) in Taichung. Another beef product, containing as much as 4.08ppb of the lean-meat agent, had been on the shelves of a Costco store in Kaohsiung.
Health authorities have ordered stores to remove US beef products found to contain the additive.
Other violations were found at supermarkets and frozen food warehouses in New Taipei City (新北市), Changhua County and Changhua City, officials said.
In related news, the FDA said that lean-meat enhancing agents were found in one goose meat product out of a total of 28 tested.
The chemical zilpaterol, which is prohibited by the Council of Agriculture, was found at 5.64ppb in a product at a traditional goose meat stall in Changhua.
Local health officials have confiscated all of the goose meat products sold at the stall and are in the process of tracking down the source of the meat.
Health officials said that the public should not be too concerned about the recent incidents because the banned chemicals were found at such low levels that they do not pose a threat to health.
Last Friday, the department announced that between 1ppb and 2ppb of Paylean had been detected in three of 24 imported beef products sold in hypermarkets in northern parts of the country. All three products came from the US.
It was the first time Paylean had been detected in US beef imports since Taiwan reopened its doors to some US beef products in 2007 after suspending imports amid concerns about mad cow disease.
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