Chinese retailers reported on panic buying of salt, partly because shoppers believe it could help ward off the effects of potential radioactivity from Japan’s crippled nuclear power plant.“Salt sold out early this morning,” an employee with a branch of French supermarket chain Carrefour in Shanghai told AFP today, declining to give her name.
She said all the salt was snapped up within 30 minutes of the store’s opening on Thursday by anxious shoppers, adding that many customers reported salt prices at other shops in the city had risen as much as six-fold.
A staff member at a supermarket in the southern city of Guangzhou said salt demand had spiked so sharply that the store had imposed temporary limits on what each customer can buy.
“There are many people queueing to buy iodised salt in our store. We have to control it. One client can only buy two bags of salt,” she said.
Salt sold in China is mostly iodised as part of a national policy to prevent iodine deficiency disorders.
Chinese consumers are now hoping iodine in the salt can reduce the impact of possible radioactivity as the crisis at Japan’s Fukushima nuclear plant deepened.
But state-run China National Radio said the iodine content of edible salt in the country averages between 20-30 microgrammes per kilogramme, quoting experts saying that is too low to have any effect.
Some shoppers apparently also believe future salt shipments could be contaminated by the disaster and were buying now to stock up on supply, Xinhua news agency reported.
Radioactive iodine from a nuclear event can pollute the air and contaminate the food supply, while thyroid glands quickly absorb the radioactive substance, causing damage, according to the US Centers for Disease Control.
Iodide pills can block radioactive iodine from being taken into the thyroid, it explained.
The official China Daily said Thursday cydiodine tablets had sold out at many pharmacies in cities including Beijing and Shanghai after the earthquake and monster tsunami struck Japan.
Anxiety has been growing in China over the potential harmful effects of radiation emissions from its Asian neighbour, despite repeated Chinese government announcements that the country faces no imminent health threat
She said all the salt was snapped up within 30 minutes of the store’s opening on Thursday by anxious shoppers, adding that many customers reported salt prices at other shops in the city had risen as much as six-fold.
A staff member at a supermarket in the southern city of Guangzhou said salt demand had spiked so sharply that the store had imposed temporary limits on what each customer can buy.
“There are many people queueing to buy iodised salt in our store. We have to control it. One client can only buy two bags of salt,” she said.
Salt sold in China is mostly iodised as part of a national policy to prevent iodine deficiency disorders.
Chinese consumers are now hoping iodine in the salt can reduce the impact of possible radioactivity as the crisis at Japan’s Fukushima nuclear plant deepened.
But state-run China National Radio said the iodine content of edible salt in the country averages between 20-30 microgrammes per kilogramme, quoting experts saying that is too low to have any effect.
Some shoppers apparently also believe future salt shipments could be contaminated by the disaster and were buying now to stock up on supply, Xinhua news agency reported.
Radioactive iodine from a nuclear event can pollute the air and contaminate the food supply, while thyroid glands quickly absorb the radioactive substance, causing damage, according to the US Centers for Disease Control.
Iodide pills can block radioactive iodine from being taken into the thyroid, it explained.
The official China Daily said Thursday cydiodine tablets had sold out at many pharmacies in cities including Beijing and Shanghai after the earthquake and monster tsunami struck Japan.
Anxiety has been growing in China over the potential harmful effects of radiation emissions from its Asian neighbour, despite repeated Chinese government announcements that the country faces no imminent health threat
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