Toxic Chinese Goods......

Toxic Chinese goods have been in Panama's news a lot in the last year or so. A toxin-laced cough syrup traced back to China lead to the painful deaths (by slow organ shutdown) of dozens of people here about 6 months ago. No surprise then that it should be Panama that detects the latest problem of Toxic Toothpaste, or that it should only become an international news item when the US gets wind of it several weeks later. It was some clever investigative journalism by the New York Times which followed the trail back to the original supplier in China.
This does however highlight the porous nature of Panama's free trade zone which is supposed to police the throughput of all goods, especially foodstuffs and medicines which supposedly require much more documentation regarding the age of goods, ingredients, and origins.