As a pharmaceutical chemist, I am dismayed that our health authority has addressed the presence of melamine in milk products by rushing to amend the food-safety regulation without giving due consideration that such amendments could cause more damage than good in the long run ('Too lax, too rushed - HK's melamine curbs under fire', September 23).

First, how on earth did the government find the 1mg per kilogram ('melamine concentration in foods for children under three and pregnant and lactating women') and 2.5 mg per kilogram 'for other foods' to be acceptable? Melamine is an organic cyanide. Its chemical name is cyanurotriamide, which is synthesised by combining three molecules of cyanamide. The impurity and decomposed products in it can be several million times more toxic than melamine itself.