Che Bufala

"It (EC) has warned Italy to take further urgent action, or risk a ban on exports of the cheese from the Campania region.
Higher than permitted levels of dioxin, which can cause cancer, had been found at some mozzarella producers.
Italy says it has traced the farms at the source of the contamination, and destroyed their milk. (BBC News)"

Now this is really a cheesy story, isn't it? With all the rubbish that people put inside themselves at McDonalds and street corner sandwich kiosks, suddenly mozzarella is cancerogenous and all Neapolitan cheese might meet an export ban. "Higher than permitted levels" sounds very much like a game of numbers to me: something along the lines of the EU regulations on fruit size and colour. Well, with all the garbage lying around the Campania countryside, I guess the food that grows out of it will not be exceptionally healthy, but in any case the families living and working there are in much bigger danger than any Japanese person buying cheese from halfway around the world. Much ado about nothing...


PS - "destroying someone's milk" is most certainly a linguistic precedent. Never heard a phrase like that before.