Pet Food = Rat Poison

[Bluetree]

ALBANY, N.Y. (March 23) - Tests turned up rat poison in the pet food suspected of causing kidney failure in dogs and cats across the country and killing at least 16, state officials and scientists announced Friday.

The toxin was identified as aminopterin, which is used to kill rats in some countries, state Agriculture Commissioner Patrick Hooker said. Aminopterin is not registered for killing rodents in the United States, though it is used as a cancer drug, according to the Environmental Protection Agency.

State officials did not say how they believe Aminopterin got into the now-recalled pet food, though they said no criminal investigations had been launched.

The Food and Drug Administration has said the investigation was focusing on wheat gluten in the pet food. Wheat gluten itself would not cause kidney failure, but the common ingredient could have been contaminated, the FDA said.

The pet deaths led to a recall of 60 million cans and pouches of pet food produced by Menu Foods and sold throughout North America under 95 brand names. There have been several reports of kidney failure in pets that ate the recalled brands, and the company has confirmed the deaths of 15 cats and one dog.

Signs of Trouble
Experts advise owners to call their veterinarian if a pet has eaten recalled food and shows symptoms of possible kidney failure. An animal could be in trouble if it:

· Stops eating
· Appears tired and lifeless
· Seems excessively thirsty
· Urinates much more than usual
· Vomits
· Has diarrhea
· Seems to have abdominal pain

Source: USA Today

Menu Foods last week recalled "cuts and gravy" style dog and cat food. The recall sparked concern among pet owners across North America. It includes food sold under store brands carried by Wal-Mart, Kroger, Safeway and other large retailers, as well as private labels such as Iams, Nutro and Eukanuba.

Menu Foods is majority owned by Menu Foods Income Fund of Streetsville. The company also makes foods for zoo cats, but those products are unaffected by the recall.

The company's chief executive and president said Menu Foods delayed announcing the recall until it could confirm that the animals had eaten its product before dying. Two earlier complaints from consumers whose cats had died involved animals that lived outside or had access to a garage, which left open the possibility they had been poisoned by something other than contaminated food, he said.

Menu Foods planned a media teleconference for later Friday, a spokesman said.

A spokesman for New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo said he was not aware of any criminal investigation involving the tainted food. FBI spokesman Paul Holstein in Albany said Friday he was not aware of any FBI involvement in the case.

"I don't know where we'll go from here," he said.

Aminopterin, also used as a cancer drug, is highly toxic in high doses. It inhibits the growth of malignant cells and suppresses the immune system.

[chickwhorips]

i just happen to read that article also.

goes back to what are people thinking?

[mimitabby]

what a crappy way to have your pets die. TERRIBLE.

[Haudlady]

From the Concord (NH) Monitor:

By Joelle Farrell
March 23. 2007 8:00AM

The Merrimack County SPCA suspects tainted food resulted in the death of seven cats, four of whom had been recently adopted. Nationally, some 60 million cans and pouches of "cuts and gravy" style food have been recalled; the food is blamed for causing kidney failure, resulting in at least 16 pet deaths.

Veterinarians have been swamped with phone calls from worried pet owners since the recall was announced last weekend. The Animal Emergency Clinic in Manchester treated several cats for kidney failure last weekend, and some are still receiving intravenous fluids in the hospital, said Judith Leclerc, a veterinarian.

"I don't think we've seen all the repercussions yet," Leclerc said. "A lot of people in hindsight are saying, 'Wow. I treated three cats from the same house for kidney failure last month.' I think just now we're putting it together. We may never know the extent of it."

Three cats died at the SPCA in Concord after they refused to eat their food and became lethargic and depressed, said Hope Bourdeau, the kennel manager. Shelter workers suspected contaminated food after owners of four recently-adopted cats called to say their cats had died.

"We couldn't understand why young, healthy cats were sick and dying," she said.

The SPCA purged its food stocks Saturday, throwing away almost half its stores. Residents and pet food retailers donated money to help. The organization has asked that anyone wishing to help donate money rather than food since nearly 100 brands of cat and dog food have been recalled.


------ End of article

By JOELLE FARRELL

Monitor staff


Oh, such nasty stuff. Those poor animals.................

[spazzdog]

Am so glad my dog boy gets dry only... a change I made a few months back.

Such a sad state of things for pets. I've heard the lawsuits are already lining up.

[RoadRaven]

This makes me think of something horrid that happened last week in one of NZ's city parks.

There is no license for the purchase of poisoned grain to control bird pests here, and somebody spread some round one of our parks... it killed a large number of ducks, pukeko, swan, seagulls and other birds such as pigeons, doves, magpies, sparrows and so forth. It is a nerve poison, so I believe the pain involved is minimal, however, there were birds convulsing in the kids playground as well as beside the water-ways where families go to feed bread to ducks etc.

Some people are just plain nasty. So unnecesary (sp?).

[smilingcat]

I do get emotionally worked up when I hear about animal cruelty. And I just can't begin to understand why people would do such things.

I also wonder about my wonderful dear cat who suffered sudden kidney failure back in Nov. '06. I had him put to sleep in the first week of Dec. He was the best cat, sweet, loving gentle big boy. He used to sleep with me. And I wonder now... The vet had kept asking me if he might have gotten into some poison or into the garage where anti-freeze might be pooled up or if he went outside.... It was just so sudden... One day he was fine the next day he was sick...

Not sure how we could protect our little friends from tainted food. You would think they would test raw ingredients before it went in? I guess not.

Shawn

[mimitabby]

I do get emotionally worked up when I hear about animal cruelty. And I just can't begin to understand why people would do such things.

I also wonder about my wonderful dear cat who suffered sudden kidney failure back in Nov. '06. I had him put to sleep in the first week of Dec. He was the best cat, sweet, loving gentle big boy. He used to sleep with me. And I wonder now... The vet had kept asking me if he might have gotten into some poison or into the garage where anti-freeze might be pooled up or if he went outside.... It was just so sudden... One day he was fine the next day he was sick...

Not sure how we could protect our little friends from tainted food. You would think they would test raw ingredients before it went in? I guess not.

Shawn

Shawn, did you feed your cat any of those suspected foods?

I am surprised there are not standards. I am sure they bought that poisoned wheat because the sellers were dumping it at a really low price.

I feed my cats the "right" food but who's to say that next month there won't be chrome filings in it or... whatever?

[KnottedYet]

It will be interesting to see which country that wheat gluten was purchased from. They must use the poison (and a LOT of it!) to control the rats in their granaries. Wonder if someone forgot to take the poison dispensers out of the grain bins, so the dispensers got processed along with the grain.

And do those granaries provide wheat products for human consumption?

[xeney]

Our local paper this morning said that the wheat was from China.

[BleeckerSt_Girl]

Yep it makes you wonder....I have not purchased any of the foods on the "bad" list....yet 3 of our 4 cats have had kidney failure in the past 4 years...one died 2 years ago. All were previously healthy and all were 5-6 years old when they suddenly got very sick (at different times though). We had been feeding various "high quality" dry food for the most part.
Perhaps this contamination is more widespread than they realize?? No way of knowing. Our 3 remaining cats are doing well at the moment- except for the one that got the kidney problem 2 months ago and is slowly recovering at this point. When I was a kid we always had lots of cats and I don't recall any of them ever getting kidney failure. What the heck is going on??? Even my vet can't figure it out, but she suspects something about the diet of cats these days.

[LBTC]

Yes, the whole scenario is quite frightening. It speaks to the tenuous nature of the food supply, and one can't help wondering how many parts of our food supply for our pets and ourselves, are compromised in some way. There are so many illnesses that are much more common these days than they ever were before - Crohn's, MS, cancer, there are soooo many diseases and problems out there!

Of course, I can never think about this for too long. I don't dare get thinking about how many poisons are around us!

Time to go find some butterflies

oh, and hugs, too

~T~

[wannaduacentury]

I know of 2 dogs that had kidney problems recently. One was my parents dog. She had an infection last nov and had iv's.To top it off she already had bladder cancer a few yrs, sadly she passed away last week at age 12 1/2. I'm not sure if the bad food hastened her death. I don't recall giving my dog Blondie tainted food either, I usually bought Purina when she got finicky about dry food. I still wonder if I did buy bad food/ She was old too, I think her death was natural causes though. My other friends dachsaund had problems too, she'd spent over $1000 to get her straight again. I'm glad they found part of the problem. I still think it goes beyond rat poison and what about human food being imported? Jennifer

[smilingcat]

Hi mimitabby,

I usually feed fancy feast, but around then I may have fed him some other brand. We had kittens at the time and we try to feed them only premium food. Most kittens come to us underweight and bit malnourished. And this last batch of kittens were already weaned but really behind developmetally so we put them on really premium food. I may have gotten Nutro (one of the recalled brand name). but not sure. All the kittens survived without getting sick so who knows.

I try not to think about this possibility. It's still upsets me. I miss my big boy. A Maine Coon mix. He was probably only 10-12 years old. Most of my kitties make it to about 17 years of age.

Shawn

[luv2ride94]

We took both my dogs to the vet yesterday b/c they stopped eating and started sleeping all the time I noticed yesterday morning. The brands that they listed had been the ones they ate but we stopped as soon as we saw the articles about it so I don't know.. The vet did some test and blood work, and kept them to put them on IV antibiotics and observe them. Today when I went to see them clyde got up and acted OK but luna just layed there and wagged her tail. I really hope its just a virus or something and the medicine will work and by monday they will be home playing fetch with me and not from the food. The vet wouldn't say much but then asked to talk to my parents which I dont like wh en that happens.