(Jamaica Gleaner) A local businessman involved in the trade of toilet paper has reportedly gone into hiding after it was discovered that his company had been packaging substandard products under the guise that they were imported from China.
Gleaner sources said the authorities found that the businessman operating outside of the Corporate Area is suspected to be in possession of at least 20 fictitious brands that he keeps rotating, claiming that the toilet papers were made in China.
A well-placed source in the manufacturing sector informed The Gleaner that the businessman cannot be located since information surfaced earlier this week that the authorities were testing the products that precipitated mounting concerns in the public domain.
The Gleaner understands that the Bureau of Standards is checking for what is called ‘Colony Forming Units’ (CFU) per gram, described as an estimate of viable bacteria or fungal numbers in the toilet tissues.
Local manufacturers of toilet papers from Italy produced high quality, which is said to be of minimal bacterial content but comparatively expensive.
It’s understood that some others import raw material from the pulp mill in neighbouring Trinidad and Tobago, with lower CFU than those out of Asia.
Bacterial vaginosis, the most common type of vaginal infection, is usually a mild problem that may go away on its own in a few days. But experts say that on occasion, it can lead to more serious problems.
So it is advisable to access medical treatment.
Experts are not sure what causes the bacteria in the vagina to get out of balance. But certain things make it more likely to happen.
The risk of contracting bacterial vaginosis is higher if the appearance of a visible colony requires significant growth of the initial cells plated – at the time of counting the colonies it is not possible to determine if the colony arose from one cell or 1,000 cells.
In microbiology, Colony Forming Units (CFU) is an estimate of viable bacterial or fungal numbers in a product. It is a term in microbiology used to quantify how many bacteria are present in a solution.
Research suggests that there is no specific number that defines either safe or unsafe CFU levels.
Some experts have proposed guidelines, however none of these have been adopted by regulatory agencies.
