From a column from Forbes:
What gets Chinese people out in the streets demonstrating every time?
Forcing parents to abide by a one-child policy, and then letting someone kill the one child to save a buck.
That is what happened in two recent cases: Chinese parents rioted after learning that local companies had poisoned almost all the children in the neighborhood.
The most recent rampage occurred in northern China’s Shaanxi Province at a lead and zinc smelting company. At least 615 out of 731 children in two nearby villages have lead poisoning, the Associated Press reported. Furious parents fought police and interfered with trucks delivering coal to the smelter that was apparently poisoning their kids. More than 150 children have been hospitalized. The government hasn’t even begun testing adults yet, according to China Daily.
Sadly, this is not an isolated incident.
See also “China factory under guard after lead poisoning” from AP, and “Number of kids poisoned by lead in China rises” from AFP, which reports that the number of children poisoned by lead has now risen to 850.
