Petco, Petsmart Phasing Out Sales of Chinese Pet Treats

Food Poisoning Bulletin

Petco and Petsmart have announced plans to stop carrying pet treats imported from China after last week’s FDA announcement that they can’t find the cause of 4,800 dog and cat illnesses. The government has been researching this issue for seven years and cannot figure out what is going wrong.

Veterinarians and the government are reminding pet owners that these treats are not necessary to a pet’s nutrition or health. Safety advocates have been asking the government to ban these imported treats for years, but nothing has been done.

Food & Water Watch commends Petco and Petsmart for taking this step, but say that they should remove those products from their shelves immediately rather than simply phasing them out. More than 1,000 dogs have died after consuming these treats.

 

 

Read More Here

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• PetSmart Pulls Chinese Jerky Pet Treats From All Stores

FDA Approved pet treats that may be poisoning your dogs and cats with toxic heavy metals.

Pet treats found contaminated with heavy metals – Health Ranger releases shocking data on lead, mercury and cadmium in dog and cat treats

 

Monday, April 21, 2014
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger

(NaturalNews) My food science research in the Natural News Forensic Food Labs has turned up yet another alarming discovery… and this time, it’s about pet treats that may be poisoning your dogs and cats with toxic heavy metals.

Over the last several months, I’ve been testing popular brands of pet treats sold by retailers like Amazon.com, and what I found is downright alarming:

• An astonishing 1.8 ppm of lead in Mundy Rawhide Gourmet Dog Treats made by a company called Cadet. The treats are made in China and labeled “NOT FOR HUMAN CONSUMPTION.”

• A startling 6 ppm of cadmium found in “Red Shrimp” reptile treats made by Zoo Med.

• A shocking level of mercury — over 0.5 ppm found in “Ocean Whitefish” cat treats made by PureBites and labeled “100% natural” and “made in the USA.”

• Over 1.5 ppm lead found in “Natural Rawhide Rings” dog treats from a company called PetSafe. The product package says “Protect. Teach. Love.” and is made in Taiwan.

See the full results right now for over 16 products at the Natural News Forensic Food Labs results page.

All results were achieved via ICP-MS laboratory testing that I conducted myself, using EPA-approved methodology variations. The Natural News Forensic Food Lab is in the process of achieving ISO 17025 accreditation.

Watch out! You may be poisoning your pet

What these results show is that high levels of toxic heavy metals are commonly found in pet treats. Even worse, these heavy metals are invisible to the human eye, and because they aren’t labeled on products, there’s no way to know how much lead, mercury, cadmium or arsenic you may be unintentionally feeding to your pet.

The picture on the right shows chew sticks that contain alarmingly high levels of lead, but you don’t see the lead in the photo, do you?

Shockingly, manufacturers never disclose heavy metals content on product labels, and retailers almost never test for heavy metals. To my knowledge, Natural News Store is the only retailer in the world that tests everything we sell for heavy metals. Amazon.com never tests what it sells, and don’t expect other retailers to, either.

See the PetSafe natural rawhide rings on the left? They’re made in Taiwan from rawhide, sorbitol and potassium sorbate. But they also contain over 1.5 ppm of lead.

Just to give you an idea of what that really means, just one rawhide ring weighing 8 grams would expose your dog to over 24 times the daily lead limit set by California Proposition 65. That’s almost a month’s worth of lead in a single pet treat.

See the full results right now at the Natural News Forensic Food Labs results page, where more than 16 pet treats are detailed.

Contaminated pet treats can kill your favorite dog or cat

Contaminated pet treats can kill your dogs or cats. The FDA openly warns about this on its website(1), saying:

Since 2007, FDA has become aware of an increasing number of illnesses in pets associated with the consumption of jerky pet treats. As of September 24, 2013, FDA has received approximately 3000 reports of pet illnesses which may be related to consumption of the jerky treats. Most of the reports involve jerky products sourced from China. The majority of the complaints involve dogs, but cats also have been affected. The reports involve more than 3600 dogs, 10 cats and include more than 580 deaths.

Over the years, thousands of family pets have been killed by contaminated pet treats, and more deaths will occur until this industry is required to meet stringent quality standards.

Sadly, the FDA still has no limits on heavy metals in pet treats or pet food, so a company can legally manufacture pet treats containing almost any level of heavy metal toxins while legally selling that product at Amazon.com or your favorite pet store.

The USDA, similarly, has no limits on heavy metals in certified organic pet food. So even “organic” pet foods and treats can contain extremely toxic levels of heavy metals while being certified organic by the U.S. government.

And while heavily-contaminated pet treats can kill your pet in a matter of hours or days, pet treats with sub-acute levels of heavy metals can still cause long-term chronic poisoning over time, where the heavy metals build up with each cumulative exposure.

Are there any pet treats with low heavy metals?

Yes! In fact, my laboratory research was able to verify that the “Real Meat Healthy Gourmet Dog & Puppy Treats” product made by the Real Meat Company(2) was remarkably low in heavy metals, registering zero cadmium, mercury and arsenic while showing only a tiny trace of lead.

 

Read More Here

Hundreds of dogs killed by contaminated jerky treats made in China; FDA still mystified by cause

 

Thursday, October 24, 2013
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger
Editor of NaturalNews.com (See all articles…)

(NaturalNews) Thousands of family dogs across the USA have been sickened by pet jerky treats made in China, and nearly 600 dogs have died. The FDA has issued a warning over the deadly jerky treats but has not forced any sort of product recall.

So far, the cause of the fatalities remains a mystery. The FDA says it has tested jerky treats for heavy metals, pesticides, antibiotics, chemicals and even Salmonella but cannot find the cause. The agency is warning pet owners to watch their pets for symptoms of poisoning which may include “decreased appetite, decreased activity, vomiting, diarrhea (sometimes with blood or mucus), increased water consumption and / or increased urination.”

Click here to view the FDA’s fact sheet on contaminated jerky treats.

According to USA Today, the deadly jerky treats “come mostly from China,” and the number of dogs sickened or killed by these treats has been rising all year.

The treats causing this epidemic of death, says USA Today, are “made of chicken, duck, sweet potatoes or dried fruit.”

Beware of pet treats made in China

Most consumers do not fully realize that pet treats do NOT have to list their country of origin. Many pet treats are highly deceptive on their packaging, sometimes showing a logo of the continental USA and claiming to be “made with beef from the USA” even though the treats themselves are manufactured in China using toxic chemicals.

The FDA has not issued a recall on the brands it suspects are causing these deaths. This is one of the problems with the agency: it already knows which products are killing dogs, but it has so far failed to release that information to the public. As a result, as more and more people learn about this, all pet treat manufacturers will suffer because consumers will shun the entire product category.

Read More Here

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The vast majority of commercially available low-fat pet foods on the market, and that includes the prescription and therapeutic diets sold by veterinary clinics, as well as vegetarian and vegan formulas are nutritionally inadequate or dogs needs.

Health And Wellness Report

Holistic Health  :  Nutrition – Diseases – Pet Health

Should Any Dog Food Formula EVER Have Corn Starch as the Main Ingredient?

By Dr. Becker

I ran across a couple of trade journal articles recently about the benefits of low-fat diets for dogs with GI disease. One was titled Low-fat petfood may benefit dogs with gastrointestinal disease, and the other was very similar: The Benefit of Low Fat Pet Food in Dogs with GI Disease.

Since I focus so heavily on nutrition with my dog and cat patients, I dove right in.

The condition the articles primarily focused on was hypertriglyceridemia-related GI disease (hypertriglyceridemia means there is a high blood triglyceride level).

The articles went on at some length about hypertriglyceridemia, and studies of miniature schnauzers (a breed prone to the condition) in which the condition was managed by switching the dogs to a low-fat diet.

The author of one article also briefly mentioned the GI diseases pancreatitis and severe gastroenteritis, including inflammatory bowel disease, with or without protein-losing enteropathy (loss of plasma proteins into the GI tract). He went on to assert that:

Even though patients do not have hypertriglyceridemia, they cannot appropriately deal with the normal amount of fat in the pet food and require the feeding of a low-fat food and the avoidance of fat-containing treats.

To be honest I found these articles confusing, since I was expecting a broader discussion of GI diseases (many of which are much more common than the abdominal symptoms seen in cases of hypertriglyceridemia) and the benefits of low-fat diets.

Indirect Advertising for a New Commercial Low-Fat Diet for Dogs with GI Disorders

Then I reached the end of one of the articles and noticed it had been “underwritten” by a manufacturer of prescription pet food diets.

Curious, I did a little more digging and uncovered the fact that the “underwriter” of the article had recently launched a new prescription low-fat dog food marketed as helpful in restoring the GI tract.

I went looking for more information on this newly released formula and found it easily. It is indeed low in fat at 7.4 percent per cup on a dry matter basis. However, the first five ingredients in the formula are:

• Corn starch
• Brewers rice
• Corn gluten meal
• Whole grain wheat
• Chicken by-product meal

The only animal product in this diet is well down the ingredient list at number 5 and it’s one of the lowest quality animal proteins available, chicken-by-product meal. AAFCO’s definition:

Chicken by-product meal consists of the dry, ground, rendered, clean parts of the carcass of slaughtered chicken, such as necks, feet, undeveloped eggs and intestines — exclusive of feathers except in such amounts as might occur unavoidable in good processing practices.

The first four ingredients (meaning there are more of those ingredients in the formula than even rendered chicken pieces-and-parts), are low-grade fillers that are also notoriously allergenic.

No matter what ails your beloved canine companion, you can certainly do much better than this at mealtime.

The Truth Is, Most Dogs Don’t Need Low-Fat Diets

There are actually only a few situations in which dogs may need a low-fat diet:

• Dogs with pancreatitis or dogs prone to the condition
• Dogs with exocrine pancreatic insufficiency (EPI) due to damage to the pancreas
• Some dogs with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD)
• Dogs with hyperlipidemia or hypertriglyceridemia that can lead to pancreatitis
• Dogs with an intolerance for dietary fat or malabsorption issues

It’s not a bad idea to try a low-fat diet with any dog with GI issues to see if the situation improves.

However, I don’t recommend the vast majority of commercially available low-fat pet foods on the market, and that includes the prescription and therapeutic diets sold by veterinary clinics, as well as vegetarian and vegan formulas. Most don’t have sufficient protein or good quality protein, and are high in grain-based carbs and other non-nutritious fillers.

For Dogs That Do Need a Low-Fat Diet …

As a general rule, the following fat content guidelines apply:

• Food with less than 10 percent fat on a dry matter basis (less than 17 percent of calories from fat) is considered low fat.
• Food with 10 to 15 percent fat (between 17 and 23 percent of calories from fat) is considered to contain moderate fat.
• Food with over 20 percent fat is considered high in fat.

It is very rare that a dog will need an extremely low-fat diet. Such diets are almost always nutritionally inadequate. The National Research Council (NRC) recommends a minimum of 5 percent fat on a dry matter basis (10 percent calories from fat) for adult dogs.

Lower fat meats to consider — whether you’re preparing your dog’s meals at home or buying commercially available formulas — include skinless chicken breasts, turkey, venison, goat, buffalo and rabbit. Lamb and pork are generally high in fat. Ground beef and other cuts of red meat vary in fat content.

I recommend you work with a holistic vet to design a nutrition plan – homemade, commercially prepared, or a combination – to meet the individual needs of a dog who requires a low-fat diet either short or long-term.

Call Toll Free: 877-985-2695

Related articles

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Vets are now reporting health problems linked to sweet potato treats similar to those related to chicken jerky treats also made in China: Veterinary Information Network (VIN)

Health And Wellness Report

 

 

 

Pet Health :  Holistic Health / Food Safety

 

 

 

 

If You Feed Sweet Potato Treats to Your Pet, Please Read This!

 

By Dr. Becker

It seems there’s another dog snack from China to worry about: sweet potato treats.

According to the Veterinary Information Network (VIN) ¹, vets are now reporting health problems linked to sweet potato treats similar to those related to chicken jerky treats also made in China.

Test results on sick dogs show kidney problems similar to the symptoms of Fanconi syndrome. Most dogs recover, but there have been some deaths related to the chicken jerky treat problem.

Symptoms may show up within hours or days after a treat is eaten and include decreased appetite, vomiting, diarrhea, lethargy, and increased thirst and urination.

If you’ve fed your dog either chicken jerky treats or sweet potato treats made in China and your pet has fallen ill, I recommend you contact your veterinarian – especially if the symptoms persist for more than 24 hours or are severe.

Pet Treats You May Want to Avoid

The brands allegedly implicated in the sweet potato treat problem are:

• Beefeaters Sweet Potato Snacks for Dogs (16 varieties of yam-related treats)
• Canyon Creek Ranch Chicken Yam Good Dog Treats (Nestlé Purina)
• Dogswell Veggie Life Vitality (4 varieties)

Keep in mind that although the problem treats are often identified as “jerky” treats, they also go by a host of other names, including tenders, strips, chips, wraps, twists, and several others.

Per Poisoned Pets ², in 2010 the FDA found that a sweet potato dog treat made by a certain company in China was contaminated with phorate, a highly toxic pesticide.

There is speculation there could be problems with pork treats and cat treats imported from China as well.

For more information on why you need to be vigilant about reading pet food labels, making phone calls to manufacturers, and really doing your homework on what you’re feeding your dog or cat, read my article Pet Food and China – More Cause for Concern?

If You Feed Your Pet Commercially Prepared Treats …

PLEASE know that if you choose to buy any treat made in China, your pet may be at risk. Chicken jerky treats, chicken tenders, chicken strips, chicken treats or sweet potato treats, they can all pose a potential threat. Play it safe. Buy only food and treats made in the U.S. Buying pet food made in this country won’t remove all risk of winding up with a tainted product, but it will certainly improve your chances of keeping your pet safe.

Consider making your own sweet potato treats at home. Try to buy produce locally and make sure to wash the sweet potatoes or yams thoroughly. Then slice them nice and thin, arrange on a baking sheet, and cook in a 300º oven for about 45 minutes. Let the slices cool and store them in plastic bags.

For homemade chicken jerky treats, buy some boneless chicken breasts, clean them, and slice into long, thin strips – the thinner the better. Place the strips on a greased or non-stick cookie sheet and bake them for at least three hours at 180 degrees. The low temp dries the chicken out slowly and the strips wind up nice and chewy. Let the strips cool, and then store them in plastic bags or another airtight container. You can also freeze them.

Update:

We have removed the reference to Drs. Foster and Smith.  We also included a message from their organization.  Drs. Foster and Smith products were not implicated in this problem.

 

Statement from Drs. Foster and Smith

There has been a lot of discussion lately on the internet regarding dog treats made in China. The FDA has been monitoring this situation and performing a battery of tests. Their web site is the most reliable source of information on this. Much of the other discussion on the internet, including some “reports”, is based on speculation rather than facts.

The FDA has not issued any report that identifies any of the Drs. Foster and Smith treats as being the cause of an illness in animals. The latest information from FDA is that after running many tests on products from multiple manufacturers for many harmful substances, they still cannot establish any link between any cases of illness in animals and treats from China. We are continuing to watch this situation closely.

Please be assured that our goal at Doctors Foster and Smith is to provide pet products of only the highest quality. The treat products we receive from China come from companies that we have worked with for many years. These companies hold quality and safety certifications from many US and European inspection agencies, and are frequently inspected by our representatives from the United States to assure they are following proper safety and quality control practices. For those people who wish to buy US-manufactured products, we carry many products made in the United States. Our dry and canned pet foods are made in the US. Many of our Doctors Foster and Smith treats are also made in the United States- for example our Premium Natural Biscuits are made here in Wisconsin. We also carry, under other labels, some chicken jerky and other treats made in the US.

References:

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• ¹ VeterinaryPartner.com
• ² PoisonedPets.com

 

 

 

Call Toll Free: 877-985-2695

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