The Centre for Food Safety in Hong Kong is alerting people that up to 48,000 cans of Greatwall Brand Chopped Pork and Ham contaminated with liquid mercury could be on the market. The Centre for Food Safety said it became aware of the problem after a complaint that one of the 340g tins contained 0.4g of silvery droplets that were later confirmed to be the toxic metal. Tests on 13 more samples of the same product of different batches from the local market had not revealed mercury droplets although more detailed test results were pending.
The Distributor Yuen Tai Trading Co has issued a full recall as a precautionary measure. “Liquid mercury is not involved in the manufacturing process of the concerned canned product,” said a spokesman. “The CFS has informed the relevant Mainland authority of the finding. The incident is still under investigation. The CFS will closely monitor the situation with appropriate follow up actions.”