Pet-food contaminant remains unknown

[PhilipShore]

Source: United Press International

WASHINGTON, April 7 Pet owners want to know the contaminant in the largest pet-food recall in U.S. history, but experts say it's like looking for a needle in a haystack.

USA Today reported Saturday that although scientists have one toxic culprit as their primary focus, they are baffled as to how the "fairly non-toxic chemical led to kidney failure in reportedly hundreds or thousands of pets." The U.S. Food and Drug Administration told USA Today it had received some 12,000 complaints from worried pet owners, although they are not sure how many pets have been affected because claims have not been investigated yet. They do know at least 15 cats have died but unconfirmed reports are far higher.

First reports of the contaminant mentioned rat poison and more recent reports have turned to melamine, a chemical used in Asia as a fertilizer. It was not known how the melamine got into the wheat gluten exported by a Chinese manufacturer.

It was Procter & Gamble, maker of Iams and Eukanuba, two popular pet foods, which found the melamine; however, the FDA remains unconvinced at this point that there was enough of the melamine to cause death in pets.

Read more: http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/49031.html

[HockeyMom]

1. It must be very bad

since most sites now are listing the brands that are safe, not the recalled ones. It's shorter to show the safe brands.

[PhilipShore]

4. I never trusted the MSM news, or the FDA from day one of the pet recall

My cat got sick; from a bag of dry Nutro or IAMS that I purchased for Christmas, for her. She is now fine -- I took her to the vet, and he prescribed a special diet, of all wet pet food.

I gave her holistic food grade Halo, and the symptoms stooped, but she did not like the food that much because of to many vegetables. Now I feed her holistic food grade Merrick's wet cat food, and she loves it.

[Double T]

2. corporate america will do EVERYTHING to cut costs..............

including chemically altering (pet) food to increase their profits. The REAL TRUTH about the tainted pet food scandal may never be known and will ultimately go the way of the anthrax 'attacks'; into the abyss. What the hell is it going to take before Americans get up off their damn couch and fight these corporate bastards?!?!? Put a few of these scoundrel corporations out of business and maybe that will jerk their heads and they take notice.

[PhilipShore]

3. I think they just make the pet foods with rotten meats, etc....

and the "politicians are paid to keep quiet" about it; because the pollution issue, nets them big $$$ from the polluters.

[BadgerKid]

6. Bet it doesn't stop with pet food

(slight rant, not directed at you :) )

There are so many preservatives and ersatz ingredients in human food. I wouldn't be surprised if much of the processed food people buy is low-grade foodstuffs doctored up to be palatable. I want to see the labels, and that makes it difficult to eat out. Yep, that's money, if/when I can afford it, that is not going to the restaurant industry. Luckily, restaurants have seen fit to introduce more raw foods into their menus because there are simply some foods I won't eat, period.

Anyway, if this pet food scandal has anything to say about it, it's going to make the organic industry skyrocket.

[kestrel91316]

12. Actually, I happen to think premium pet foods are probably a lot

safer and healthier and have more nutrition in them than most processed foods for people. Pet foods have to have some degree of balance between nutrients if they make any such claim (and they do).

Processed food for people is the TRUE junk: CheezWhiz, Twinkies, corn dogs, ice cream that contains no cream, Wonder Bread, pre-cut and trimmed ready-to-eat PBJ sandwiches in the freezer case.........the list goes on. They contain NO DISCERNABLE NUTRIENTS WHATSOEVER as far as I can see, but Americans just LOVE them.

I'd rather eat cat food.

[lovuian]

5. All these scientists and they don't know

and so we don't know if its in other things???

FDA
We Don't know

[kestrel91316]

13. The melamine may or may not be the toxic contaminant, but it IS

a readily-detected contaminant which is currently serving as a good marker for adulterated wheat gluten.

The toxicologists are working on IDing some other substance in there, last I heard. They aren't gonna speculate. They will not say anything until they ID it and verify it.

[dansolo]

7. They are still underreporting the deaths

15 cats? From what I have read, over 1000 cats and dogs have died with similar conditions in the past four months or so.

[PhilipShore]

8. The Oregonian: Oregon's pet toll increases to 110

The Oregonian

In Oregon, state public health veterinarian, Emilio DeBess, increased the toll of poisoned pets today to 110 suspected cases, with 40 deaths.

http://blog.oregonlive.com/breakingnews/2007/04/del_monte_expands_recall_as_or.html

[A Brand New World]

11. There have been 3 deaths just with my vet in small-town Ohio. Take

that times the number of vets in the country and it's in the thousands. Plus my mom's dog died in the care of another vet. That's just ones I know about. Definitely under-reported numbers by the FDA and purposefully so.

[Rainscents]

9. Of course, it's "UNKNOWN!"

FDA IS FUCKING LYING AGAIN... TO PROTECT CORPORATE WHORES!

[Malva Zebrina]

10. I don't believe a word of it

none of it.