Comments on: Pet-food recall: How to count, what to feed

By: Bernard J. (Bernie) Starzewski

Bernard J. (Bernie) Starzewski — Fri, 30 Mar 2007 14:05:39 +0000

I am really getting concerned with the very consistent posting about the lack of alarm exhibited by vets.
I read one posting linked to by petconnection from the University of Washington as an advisory to vets that spent 2/3 of its text essentially telling them to be dismissive of their clients suspicions. The reasons cited ranged from potential reporting of unrelated coincidental illnesses to outright fraud from those seeking to capitalize on law suits.

There was not one word about serving the public or utilizing their scientific training to fully examine every case in their best professional judgement. The message was effectively, watch out for irrational customers fretting over Poopsey…

If this is the position of a major vet school then it is little wonder that DVMs are are so non-commital. While everything that they said was technically true, in my opinion they put a distorted emphasis on discarding additional possibilities.

In the case of my own vet previously posted here, even the FDA rep I spoke to was incredulous when I related her characterization of my dog’s symptoms as a “red herring”.

I was informed that someone from the FDA office in Green Bay was probably going to come down and collect some of the remaining cans for testing. I also gave permission to the FDA to review all of Brandy’s vet records - something that I do not think will make my vet very happy given her past reactions…

Both large and small animal vets are the sentinels for larger health concerns ranging from bird flu to “mad cow” to rabies. If we cannot rely on them to do a thorough job in policing public health for animals how are we to trust them to safeguard situations that may have more human consequences in the future?

At at time when the federal government requires each and every farmer to submit livestock ID data for tracking each and every animal not only for public health but homeland security what does this say about the DVM community’s role in those scenarios?

After this I think I can be excused for viewing the professionalism of vets with a more jaundiced eye.

Bernie

By: Ginger

Ginger — Fri, 30 Mar 2007 01:50:06 +0000

There has been no recall on any type of dry food, but I’m reading that there have been problems with that as well. The dry foods are not manufactured by Menu, but Iams and the others use a lot of corn as a filler, which there may or may not be a problem with. As of yet, it’s unclear to anyone who’s pet has not become ill from the dry food. I’m in the process of switching my dogs to Solid Gold dry, a company that doesn’t use Menu Foods to process any of their products, and doesn’t use corn or wheat. They make products for both dogs and cats. There are a few other companies that do not manufacture their canned products at Menu Foods, as well, such as Timberwolf Organics, which, unfortunately, my dogs won’t touch. I strongly suggest boycotting any company affiliated with Menu Foods, as it would send a clear message to this manufacturer that this extreme negligence is unacceptable. Perhaps if pet owners across the country team up and put Menu Foods and its affiliates out of business, more care will be taken by the existing pet food companies so something like this is not allowed to happen again.

By: Joy

Joy — Fri, 30 Mar 2007 01:12:26 +0000

I have been feeding my kittens and 15 y/o kitty cat Iams for ever. The dry and the pouches, I checked all the recalled product code numbers against the ones I had, fortunately they didn’t match. Although reading 4ldgfriend 3/29’s note I guess it may have been devine intervention, my cats are fine. I have started to buy Tuna and Chicken in cans because I’m afraid to feed them anything else. Does anyone have information whether the 5lb. bags of Iams dry kitten and weightcontrol were recalled, the only food I saw
listed was the pouches and canned food.

By: Janice

Janice — Fri, 30 Mar 2007 00:25:34 +0000

The FDA representative from the Shreveport, LA office who called me as a follow-up to my complaint with the Louisiana state FDA office in New Orleans said the four state region for which he worked had logged more than 8,000 complaints about pet food in the last 2 weeks!!!!!!!!! He seemed to think I would have received a quicker response if I had called the Shreveport office 1st instead of calling the NO office. My complaint has been sent to the Kansas City office because that is the region in which the pet food was manufactured. Our cat died of acute renal failure after eating Hill’s Prescription c/d DRY food. We had bought a new bag of food just a few days before he was stricken.

Please continue to call the FDA. The number of 8,000 for just the four states of Louisiana,Mississippi, Tennessee, and Alabama is staggering. Just think what it must be in the northeastern United States or California. This number is much higher than what is being reported on Pet Connection.

My vet who went to extraordinary means to try to save our cat thinks the corn in the Hill’s could possibly be contaminated.

We switched our dogs to an organic food. They were eating Nutro but had not exhibited any symptoms. However, we wanted to be safe rather than sorry.

By: Marie

Marie — Fri, 30 Mar 2007 00:24:31 +0000

I’ve been feeding my two cats Science Diet, thinking that I was getting the very best for them. They’ve done very well on it, actually, but needless to say— the trust is gone. Also, I was never aware before about the heavy use of corn as a filler, or about by-products. I wanted to find a new food for my cats from a company that had no association with Menu foods; uses domestic products; has no corn, wheat or soy; and has meats or meat meals as the first ingredients. The food would also have to have lots of Omega 3 and 6, because one of my cats has very senstive, dry skin. After exhaustive research, I decided to try Felidae and drove a country mile to a place that carries it.

After going over the packaging and talking with the extremely knowledgable man who runs the store, I found that it would meet all my requirements. I also liked the herbs, fruits and oils in it. There was not a price for it on the shelf, and when I went up to pay I was expecting to lay down a big chunk of change for this obviously superior food. Normally I am completely cheap, even with my own food— but nothing is too good for my very spoiled cats. To my absolute shock, though— the Felidae cost half of what I was paying for the Science Diet! I am in the process of changing them over on to the Felidae, and so far they seem to really like it.

By: Joseph

Joseph — Thu, 29 Mar 2007 22:13:50 +0000

GM grains…

Guess what? High fructose corn syrup is made almost entirely form GM corn. It’s also fed to poultry and beef in the U.S. and Canada. The stuff is also making people sick as well.

My educated guess is that the GM corn, which is a main ingredient in dry pet foods is causing numerous problems. The GM corn in question didn’t exist before ~2002, so this is a recent change - and why food we fed for years was safe but suddenly is causing problems.

Organ meat from animals that are the grain is also just as bad. But I suspect that Menu went with feed corn to save money - and it was this GM stuff instead.

By: 4lgdfriend

4lgdfriend — Thu, 29 Mar 2007 21:23:12 +0000

I really hope that all of us who have been “crying in the wilderness” for years about the abuses of the petfood and pharmaceutical companies are going to finally
be heard by the 98% who have treated us like
hippie freako new age kooks ——— who just happen to care about our animals enough to do something different - and say NO to the currently accepted practices.

By: 4lgdfriend

4lgdfriend — Thu, 29 Mar 2007 21:13:49 +0000

1. More on the idea of GMO grains possibility from DVM Phd http://www.drpitcairn.com/nutrition/gm_foods.html The FDA does not require any safety tests on genetically modified foods…There are no adequate tests on “biochemistry, immunology, tissue pathology, gut function, liver function and kidney function,”[3] and animal feeding studies are too short to adequately test for cancer, reproductive problems, or effects in the next generation. ……animals fed GM crops developed potentially precancerous cell growth, smaller brains, livers and testicles, damaged immune systems, bigger livers, partial atrophy of the liver, lesions in the livers, stomachs, and kidneys, inflammation of the kidneys, problems with their blood cells, higher blood sugar levels, and unexplained increases in the death rate. (See Spilling the Beans, August 2004.) None have been adequately followed-up or accounted for.”

By: 4lgdfriend

4lgdfriend — Thu, 29 Mar 2007 21:11:48 +0000

For pets with immune systems compromised by the effects of this toxin(s) (see VIN for info on that) please be aware that vaccinations should NOT be given to pets that are already ill.
It’s not only the petfood industry that panders to vets for profit - big PHARMACEUTICAL COMPANIES also do this. For a look at what one forward looking DVM with PHD in immunology has to say about this see: http://www.drpitcairn.com/talk.....cines.html
I HOPE THE LID IS BLOWN OFF BUT GOOD.

By: Mike V

Mike V — Thu, 29 Mar 2007 21:11:02 +0000

I thank this website for trying to keep on top of this problem. There is a bigger issue here in my opinion. The manufacturer almost immediately identified a “new supplier”, whom they also identify as being from China. One of MSNBC’s stories on this quoted someone from a famous cancer institute as saying that it is unlikely this poison would be there unless someone put it there. That unknown person may or may not have known whether it would end up in pet food or people food. But the end result is clear — it points out, clearly, that someone could introduce a poison into a food product bound for the US in a foreign country and there are apparently no quality controls or safeguards. Yet so far Homeland Security and the feds are silent. And they clearly are afraid to implicate China — not the manufacturer, per se — in something that is much, much bigger than anyone is willing to report.

This is very, very scary in its implications.