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High levels lead, other toxins found in pet toys
By Christie Keith
November 24, 2009
Oh yay. Another thing to worry about. This time, it’s high levels of lead and other toxins found in dog and cat toys.
Via Dr. Eric Barchas on Dogster’s VetBlog, a report from HealthyStuff.org:
HealthyStuff.org tested over 400 pet products, including beds, chew toys, stuffed toys, collars, leashes, and tennis balls. Since there are no government standards for hazardous chemicals in pet products, it is not surprising that toxic chemicals were found.
45% of pet products tested had detectable levels of one or more hazardous chemical, including:
One-quarter of all pet products had detectable levels of lead. 7% of all pet products have lead levels greater than 300 ppm — the current CPSC lead standard for lead in children’s products. Nearly half of pet collars had detectable levels of lead; with 27% exceeding 300 ppm — the CPSC limit for lead in children’s products. One half (48%) of tennis balls tested had detectable levels of lead. Tennis balls intended for pets were much more likely to contain lead. Sports tennis balls contained no lead.
I guess this is one we can’t blame on the FDA, and yet… the presence of dangerous toxins in everyday items like toys — toys that might be sold for pets, but certainly don’t magically self-destruct if a child starts gnawing on them — is certainly directly related to the almost complete lack of safety regulation on products being imported into this country from places with less than stellar safety and health practices in manufacturing, hello, China.
Although of course, even children’s toys from China were recalled by Mattel for high lead levels while the 2007 pet food recall was still going on — remember this?
Think long and hard about all the “Made in China” toys and collars you buy your pets, not to mention the source of the supplements in their food and yours. The reality is, when you decide you’re never going to buy anything made in China ever again, you’d better be willing to starve your pets and yourself, and go naked, because it’s not easy.
Which seems like a good reason to relentlessly inspect and test everything we import from them, but hey, what do I know? I’m just a pet blogger.
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I always wondered why the tennis balls made for dogs “stunk to high heaven”. Poisoned coating, maybe?
What do I know? I am just a pet commentator.
Comment by Colorado Transplant — November 24, 2009 @ 9:41 am
Oh Goodness for the first time I bought two doggie tennis balls this weekend, usually I use the people kind, so in the trash they will go. Good thing they only cost a couple of bucks.
Comment by Snoopys Friend — November 24, 2009 @ 9:50 am
Yup..been saying since March 2007 that it wasn’t a fluke that melamine and cyanuric acid was found in a Chinese “ingredient”…(I still wonder how long it might have been if the cyanuric acid was not involved -or broke down or whatever it was to cause the melamine cyanurate) and I also wonder if it was just a coinky-dinky that melamine showed up in baby formula not too long after…had to go somewhere right? and this I just read regarding one of the Chinese melamine victim’s father.. http://www.hrichina.org/public....._id=172422
Comment by Carol V — November 24, 2009 @ 9:56 am
Another thing to keep in mind when keeping your pets away from toxins that a lot of people don’t think of is that most wrapping papers are highly toxic, and you should take special precautions when allowing your pets to open their own presents. I know you can get pet-safe wrapping paper at Petco, that’s about the only 100% safe solution that I’ve personally come up with.
Comment by Chris — November 24, 2009 @ 12:29 pm
I can think of a “safe” solutions that don’t involve spending money for special wrapping paper for pets, which is more than likely made in China anyway and as such, pretty damn suspect.
If you feel compelled to wrap a pet’s gift, use newsprint or paper grocery bags, and don’t let your pet eat the wrapping. Easy-peasy, and you don’t have to spend on crap no one needs that’s just more stuff to throw away.
Comment by Gina Spadafori — November 24, 2009 @ 12:39 pm
I like the idea of the grocery bag wrapping paper for our pet gifts and they can be prettied up too with your own Christmas Designs just in case a person wants something that looks a little more special under the tree. After all the dogs won’t care much.
Comment by Snoopys Friend — November 24, 2009 @ 2:15 pm
It’s the “lead in the toys” that has me unrepentant at the grocery store, loading up on paper grocery bags as a dog toy. I take my own bags for places where they give out plastic bags, but Pepper really enjoys shredding a paper bag every night before we go to bed and considering that the paper bags don’t have funny dyes on them (at least at my grocery store), it just seems a lot safer to let her shred paper bags than to buy her dog toys.
Comment by Dorene — November 24, 2009 @ 5:14 pm
I agree with Dorene since it’s common to dogs that they like shredding things around the house. It’s safer to use paper bags and avoid plastic bags on your groceries. So be careful to organize anything and everything around the house. Anything made of plastic should be on its right place not accessible to our dogs in the house. Let’s bring our own bags when buying groceries to avoid bring home plastic bags. This way, we are also helping the environment not just our dogs.
Comment by colshe — November 24, 2009 @ 6:27 pm
Back in September, the Washington Toxics Coalition announced this report. Like most, I thought, “China…again.” But Ivy Sager-Rosenthal of the Coalition said “We found it [toxics] in both American and foreign made products.” There are other safety qualifiers lists in the post here http://www.dancingdogblog.com/.....rom-china/
Comment by Mary Haight — November 27, 2009 @ 1:12 am
Here’s the page with searchable fields for specific toys or brands (upper righthand corner of page):
http://www.healthystuff.org/departments/pets/
Comment by The OTHER Pat — November 27, 2009 @ 9:58 am
Very few dog items are made in the U.S., if any. Chinese made items will not go away. Toys, beds, crates, food ingredients, most all dog items and tons of human stuff. I buy human toys for my dogs. I always check the baby section at Thrift stores and also make sure that the label does not say “made in China”. I also stuff old socks with old socks as toys. Socks can be bought for next to nothing at a thrift store. I also wash old tennis balls and stick them into a double wrapped sock. They love to grab it by the “tail” and fling it.
Jodi
Comment by Jodi Eckardt — November 30, 2009 @ 8:45 am