Paul Midler discusses product quality issues with this most recent example:

A Shanghai pharma company may have managed to disqualify the entire Greek weightlifting team from the Olympics after shipping them tainted health supplements. A surprise inspection of the Greek team by the World Anti-Doping Agency revealed that 11 of the team’s athletes had unapproved substances in their systems. The Chinese firm has already apologized for providing the bad product, saying: “We send [sic] you L-tyrosine mixed with something else that it [sic] only for research purposes.”

Nothing against Paul's take on the incident, but this whole thing just
can't be true. It's way too funny and seems like something out of an
Elmore Leonard novel. What are the chances that two of the hottest of the hot-button China issues of the past 12 months (Olympics and product quality – you can throw sports doping in there as well) would come together in one story like this? Makes you believe in a higher being.

I have a friend who is a criminal defense lawyer in Boston. Maybe I should send this story to him and see if he can try a new defense strategy: "Your honor, my client ordered baking soda from a Chinese factory in Dongguan. He had no idea that the white powdery substance in that plastic baggie they sent him was cocaine, and he will be demanding his money back from the Chinese supplier. You know those Chinese factories, your honor, and these mistakes are quite common." Well, I suppose a judge might not buy it, but a jury in Suffolk County? Worth a try.