http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fumaric_acid

Fumaric acid , or trans-butenedioic acid, is the chemical compound with the formula HO2CCH=CHCO2H. This white crystalline compound is one of two isomeric unsaturated dicarboxylic acids, the other being maleic acid wherein the carboxylic acid groups are cis. It has a fruit-like taste. The salts and esters of fumaric acid are known as fumarates.

Fumaric acid, when added to food products, is an acidity regulator denoted by E number E297.

EU BANS DIMETHYL FUMARATE

Several European Union (EU) countries such as France, Finland, Poland, Sweden and the United Kingdom have reported consumers suffered serious health problems after having a direct exposure to Dimethyl Fumarate from their consumer products. Common symptoms include itchy skin, irritation, redness, burns, and even acute respiratory problems in some serious cases. The European Commission decided on 17 March, 2009 to ban the use of this anti-fungal agent in all types of consumer products. From 1 May, 2009, a product or part of a product containing more than 0.1 mg/kg of Dimethyl Fumarate is prohibited from being placed or made available on the EU market. Furthermore, any product which contains Dimethyl Fumarate, that has already been placed or made available on the market, have to be withdrawn and even recalled. How can you determine if Dimethyl Fumarate exists in your products? If Dimethyl Fumarate is found, how can you verify if the amount of Dimethyl Fumarate is below the regulatory threshold?

Posted: Sun Jun 22, 2008 4:04 am BY Margaret Brown

G'day Pamela, How you going? and How is my girl-friend Lil-Leah looking beautiful as ever.

My sister sent me a email about another toxic chemical and the Chinese use to stop the mould in the clothing and lounge leather products that are being shipped it is called DMF. The only reason she mentioned this is due to our delicate skins and Oscar 's. This title is from the uk mail on line: "This baby was burned red raw by a sofa giving off toxic fumes. As our investigation reveals, there are hundreds of other victims". It goes on to say(this is a cut and paste of the relevant points.
"At first, his parents thought it was no more than a rash. Soon the rash had covered his entire body and turned into blisters.Then the blisters became burns - as if someone had been stubbing out cigarettes on him. By the time baby Archie Lloyd-Bennett saw a specialist, he was red raw.Six-month-old Charlie Mather, from Leeds, is still swathed in bandages from head to toe after contracting a rash from his mother Danielle's sofa.Children were not the only victims. Paula Brooks, 41, from, Devon, was put on an antibiotic drip. Plasterer Steven Irwin, 48, a plasterer from Lancashire, ended up in casualty. Isobel McNeil, 49, from Dumfriesshire, was off work for six months.
We now know that all these victims were exposed to a substance called dimethyl fumarate (DMF). It is a particularly toxic fungicide. Those who come into contact with it should wear protective glasses and clothing. How could any of those who were injured have possibly known they were at risk simply by sitting on the sofa at home?Sachets of DMF, it transpires, were put in thousands of Chinese manufactured suites to stop them going mouldy in storage or while being transported.But it seemed to be that when anyone sat on these sofas, a chemical reaction was set in motion. Body heat caused the dimethyl fumarate to vapourise. The poisonous vapour was released into the leather. The contact often resulted in burns. Sometimes it took months for the effects to become apparent. Doctors were baffled. There is no mystery now - only a scandal which has resulted in one of the biggest 'product liability' claims in British legal history.
At stake, apart from compensation expected to total roughly £10 million, is the reputation of three British retailers: Argos, Land of Leather and Walmsley Furnishing.
Did they put the welfare of their customers first when the danger emerged last summer? Lawyers representing victims claim Land of Leather and Walmsley Furnishing may not have done.
Indeed, one of the sofas was still on sale this week at the Walmsley Furnishing showroom in Preston, Lancashire, for the knockdown price of £399. Another was on display at their Ashton-under-Lyne branch, Greater Manchester, for the same price. A sign on it read: 'Great value for money.'
In one way or another, of course, money is at the heart of this scandal.
The chain of events which ended in Archie's terrible ordeal began in a potholed street in the city of Dongguan in southern China.
Among the dilapidated industrial buildings is one without a sign. This, it turns out, is the factory where the 'contaminated' furniture, supplied to Argos, Land of Leather and Walmsley's, was made."
More than 1,200 workers are employed at the Lianzi Furniture Company. Most are paid 1,500 yuan a month (£110), and some as little as 770 yuan (£57). The average monthly wage in China is 2,077 yuan (£154).
But then cheap labour in the Guangdong province, the country's manufacturing base, equals fat profits for foreign firms which do business with China, the fastest growing economy in the world.
That's the upside. The downside is that China is becoming the Arthur Daley of international trade, struggling to match quality with quantity. The 'crime sheet' is endless.

Toys, including Barbie dolls, coated with lead paint had to be removed from shops last year; Bindeez beads feared to contain date rape drug GHB; toothpaste with the same ingredients used to make anti-freeze. Now dodgy sofas - and, some might say, dodgy safeguards for consumers.

The sofas first aroused suspicion in May last year, when a patient went to consultant dermatologist Sandra Winhoven at St Helens Hospital on Merseyside. She was convinced that her new Argos suite was the cause of her skin complaint: if she put a cover on the sofa, she said, the pain and irritation subsided.
'Soon after that case, I saw several people who had bought new sofas. I began to think they could be the cause of the problem,' says Dr Winhoven.


This is really frightening stuff.

Marg

Posted: Fri Jun 27, 2008 12:41 pm BY LETS TALK

Wow.............great information Marge,

Yes, really scary! So glad don't have any couches anywhere.

Thank you so much for this info. I would like put this in the announcements page . Do you by any chance have any links to this article ?

Posted: Sat Jun 28, 2008 8:28 am BY Margaret Brown

Hello Ms Pamela,

I searched the uk daily mail and came up with this link - I have recently been educating my fellow colleagues that are having children not to purchase products made in China and in particular baby doonas (i think you call them quilts in the U.S).

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/search.html?s=y&searchPhrase=dimethyl%20fumarate

Posted: Sat Jun 28, 2008 8:39 am BY LETS TALK



Perfect, that is what I wanted......... thank you ...I will put it up as an announcement later after I finish my coffee and wake up <G>

Posted: Sat Jun 28, 2008 8:42 am BY Margaret Brown

Funnily enough you are waking up and I will be going to bed it's 10.42 pm on Saturday. For a few hours on either side of the world we are both awake. The email is a wonderful invention isn't it!!

Posted: Sat Jun 28, 2008 9:57 am BY LETS TALK




I know, it's odd that when am getting up you are getting ready for bed :)


Thanks......... This is important info for people and their pets and human loved ones.