Personal Injury Law

Consumer Product Safety - Importing Consumer Products Can Impose Third World Regulatory Standards on America

By Steve Lombardi

Two prenatal units in Turkey had 40 newborns die of bacterial infection.

What hospitals are involved? "In July, the Ankara facility became the scene of any parent's hell. A total of 27 newborns died there within two weeks, most of them from infection.

Now Turkey is reeling from a similar tragedy at another hospital, this time in the western city of Izmir, where 13 premature babies died last weekend within 24 hours, apparently from tainted IV treatment."

What caused the deaths? "A preliminary investigation concluded that the infants died of a bacterial infection spread by IV treatment."

Turkey's admission to the EU depends upon Turkey's progress towards modernization. You see Turkey wants access to the European union's economy to improve their own. Sort of like the Chinese wanting access to the U.S. economy; which they have access. The E.U. has been slow to move Turkey along towards membership and now. it should turn glacially slow. I can appreciate a situation where a few babies become ill, but how do so many die? After the first one, then two and three why didn't the hospital staff go into full alert? What did they do to determine the cause of death and to stop the infection's progress? Obviously, this demonstrates why third-world cultures should not have access to the more developed economies of the world until they show sufficient progress towards regulatory oversight that we are safe.

The recent melamine scare should give us all pause when purchasing products at the grocery store. In what country was the product manufactured? These incidents coupled with an Administration that hates regulations and under funds those agencies responsible for enforcement leaves the American consumer exposed to enormous risks. As an American consumer what you have to ask yourself is can you afford the risks? With the President continually pointing to allowing market forces to govern we are heading for a slippery slope with growing risks within our own markets.

I'm bothered by this President and his Administration. Its policies border on callousness and seem unfeeling. Those in charge seem uncaring and unsympathetic towards those they consider under them. The official policy is no money for social security but billions for Wall Street and War Street. I've been asking myself why 50% of the population continues to vote for more of the same. It may baffle some of you, but not me. Not any more. The voters want what they want no matter what the truth is. Most of us don't want the truth to get in the way of our own gratification. As a culture we want more, not less; no matter the cost. We don't save, we don't do without, we just charge on credit. We live above our means and in the end we have everything and yet we have nothing. We see our corporate leaders get bailed out after running corporate America with few assets and a mountain of debt backed by paper assets. Those paper assets are so weak that an 8% drop in value causes cataclysmic ripples in the economy while sinking major corporations. Headlines, news agencies and pundits discuss $700 billion without putting it into perspective for the average person.

We shouldn't wonder why the politicians are lying to us. We punished the last Presidential candidate who offered up the truth about higher taxes and U.S. debt spending. If we punish those who tell us the truth then expect more lies to get elected to do what needs to be done to run this country.

Do you know what this $700 billion is going to cost you? Do you care? Does anyone care? Have you written to your Congressman and Congresswoman? Why not?

Full post as published by Des Moines Personal Injury Lawyer on September 28, 2008 (boomark / email).