Two hugeindustries affecting the lives of millions of people are currently subject to big health alerts. Concern over serious side-effects has cast a long shadow over promising new painkillers, known as cox-2 inhibitors, developed by the pharmaceutical industry. Evidence linking the drugs to an increased risk of heart attacks led the US giant Merck to withdraw its version, known as Vioxx, from the market last September, and an investigation by the -US Food and Drug Administration is currently under way.
More recently, it was the turn of the UK food industry, with the discovery of traces of a banned dye known as Sudan I in a sauce made by Premier Foods, a leading UK supplier. In the ensuing health scare, the UK Food Standards Agency found that hundreds of products had been inadvertently contaminated by the dye, which has been linked to cancer.
