Wal-Mart: Melamine traces in (made in China) dog treats

[UpInArms]

Source: Associated Press

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. - Tests of two Chinese brands of dog treats sold at Wal-Mart stores found traces of melamine, a chemical agent that led to another massive pet food recall in March, a spokeswoman said Tuesday.

Wal-Mart Stores Inc. quietly stopped selling Chicken Jerky Strips from Import-Pingyang Pet Product Co. and Chicken Jerky from Shanghai Bestro Trading in July, after customers said the products sickened their pets.

No recall was announced at that time, but Wal-Mart said in a statement Tuesday that customers who bought one of the products should return it to the nearest store for a refund.

Company spokeswoman Deisha Galberth said 17 sets of tests done on the products found melamine, a contaminant that's a byproduct of several pesticides.

<snip>

More than 150 brands of pet food were recalled earlier this year after U.S. inspectors said wheat gluten from China that was used to make the food was tainted with melamine. An unknown number of dogs and cats died.

Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070822/ap_on_bi_ge/wal_mart_dog_treats

[OhioChick]

1. K&R

For those with dogs. :kick:

[Rydz777]

2. First they try to poison our babies, and now our pooches. I

long for the time when the food we ate - and fed our kids and pets - was produced, processed, and inspected in the United States.

[OhioChick]

3. Those Days are Long Gone. n/t

[shaniqua6392]

4. We now feed all of our animals raw.

Also we make our own treats or buy Wellness treats with NO grains. I knew that the recall in the past was not over. They just wanted us to forget all about it and run out and buy their crap. They are still buying the grains from China. If you want to use a jerky treat for training, buy bags of the jerky bits for humans. Hopefully, they are made in the U.S.A. Thanks for the update on the treats. It is good to keep spreading the word.

[napi21]

6. I switched to making my own dog food back when this whole mess

started! I've been very suspicious that things have become so quiet lately. I agree with you. Unless the buyers STOP buying this Chinese junk, the problems WON'T go away!

[smirkymonkey]

5. I don't get it - wouldn't it just be cheaper and less toxic to put

dirt into products as a filler? Or sand? Or even rice flour? What is it with the Chinese and chemicals?

[shaniqua6392]

7. The melamine falsely raises the protein level.

So when it is tested, they can brag that it has a 27% protein level when it really does not. It really contains melamine which is used to make plastic products. The melamine crystallizes in the animals kidneys and kills them. Meat is used to raise the protein levels in reputable dog foods. Dogs do not need any grains yet they pump their food full of it. Dogs get enough "grains" from eating the meat of animals that eat grains. This is how wild dogs/wolves got the small amount of grain. My dogs are on a completely grain free diet, including snacks and treats. Try carrots and other raw veggies that you put in the freezer too. They absolutely love them. I have one dog that loves ice cubes!! No calorie crunchy treats. Dogs are so crazy. We love ours in this country and China just does not get that.

[smirkymonkey]

12. Thanks! I had no idea. So there was some method to their

madness, even though it was evil :grr: I thought they were just looking for filler.

You made an interesting point about cultural differences concerning dogs. To us and a lot of Europeans, dogs are like members of the family - to some of us, they are elevated above human status! However in other parts of the world, not only are they not looked at with affection, but they are seen as food or even as vermin. Therefore, they don't care about them and can't imagine how much we do.

[Doremus]

17. Actually, melamine isn't very toxic.

It's the cyanuric acid and acetaminophen that's killing dogs and cats.

http://petfoodtracker.blogspot.com/2007/06/aspca-issues-alert-on-acetaminophen-in.html

http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/news/s_510984.html

[sarcasmo]

8. When do all these negative stories of made in China product start to hurt Walmart?

[proud patriot]

9. "walmart quietly removed them from the shelves"

:grr: so there is still a dog getting those treats at home :grr:

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

10. agreed! This is the definition of "unconscionable"

How mad do you think Wal Mart pet owners will be when they find out that WalMart while aware of the issue but did NOT take that second step of notifying dog owners who beloved companion is about to get that deadly treat this weekend.

This needs to be posted on pet forums everywhere. After knowing this, why would anyone buy pet food at Wal Mart?

[cascadiance]

11. Damn! When is this going to stop! My vet bills have gone over $6k the last two months!

When one of my cats got hypothyrodism and I had her treated with radioactive iodine therapy. She seems to be OK now, but there's just now a story on how that's caused by flame retardants in furniture and other things. Wish I could figure out what it is. She's been doing fine at my Mom's house recuperating, but now that she's been back at my house, she's vomitting again. Must be something in the house that's triggering it. Leave it to the FDA to ignore doing some good analysis of this sort of stuff!

And while that was happening, my other cat got diagnosed with intestinal cancer, and I just had him operated on last week to have the tumor removed, which was malignant. I wonder how much of this stuff helped trigger that too!

When I'm trying to find them food to transition to in both of these situations (my first cat has a hard time eating much of anything, and I won't switch back to IAMS), it makes it really hard to make sure you aren't making the situation worse!

[shaniqua6392]

13. Oh my gosh....

I am so sorry about your kitties! That just sounds like too much to bear. I am not sure about the flame retardants, etc. I will post the issue on some of the pet message boards we belong to and see what we can come up with. If I find anything I will get back with you. Our cats would not go for the raw diet thing so we researched cat foods extensively. We came up with a dry food called felidae and they love it. I have a VERY picky little boy cat and he used to only eat Friskies Turkey and Cheese. After the recall, I was too afraid to feed Friskies. So we found Merrick canned cat foods and he absolutely loves them. They are made in the U.S. with only American ingredients. They have such things as Grammy's Pot Pie which has real chunks of meat/potato/veggies etc. It smells good enough for me to eat!! All human grade ingredients. They are both doing really well and I feel much better knowing I am not going to poison them with crap from China. Anyway, I hope this helps and I hope your cats get healthy soon!! Blessings and peace.

http://www.merrickpetcare.com/#

http://canidae.com/

[cascadiance]

14. My one cat I have trouble with I'm advised to go easy on the protein...

... since she had some problems with her kidney readings before the radioactive iodine therapy. Since she isn't a heavy eater, he does agree that we need something with perhaps a little more *natural* fat in it to get her body weight back up. Kind of the opposite problem I have with the other cat, who eats too much.

[shaniqua6392]

16. I have one chubby girl

and a really skinny boy! I know what you mean there. I have to feed skinny boy on the dryer where chubby girl can not jump and eat all of the food. How funny. Ask your vet about some of the Wellness products available. They do have some varieties for specific issues in cats. They are a lot cheaper than some of the "prescription" diets that vets often offer to us. I have been reading on the flame retardant issue in cats. I never knew anything about this. Wow. Nothing yet on how you get rid of the flame retardants in our homes. Just wash the carpets, furniture, etc. I am glad I saw your post earlier. My little boy cat got so sick about a year ago we almost lost him. I force fed him feline bitch's milk with a syringe every few hours. He kept hiding and looked like he just wanted to die. They never could figure it out. He finally got better. Makes me wonder. Was it something in his food or in my house? Yikes.

[Doremus]

18. Green tripe is good for dogs with kidney disease

because of its protein/phosphorus ratio. I wonder if it's good for cats too? I'll go ahead and post these links here for dog owners who might be dealing with a kidney patient.

I use Solid Gold (for dogs)
http://www.solidgoldhealth.com/products/showproduct.php?id=60&code=262

Here's a good diet for dogs with kidney failure:
http://www.windyhollowvet.com/Document/info/ChronicRenalFailureDiet.pdf.

[The Backlash Cometh]

15. I'm so freaked out about melamine, that I didn't even buy something that

was suppose to be made of melamine. Can't remember what it was, now.

[NYC]

20. I have a melamine cooking utensil,

and I think about the pet food every time I use it to flip over some food. That's what they were putting in pet food.

[The Backlash Cometh]

21. It WAS in the cooking department!

I was putting together cooking utensils for a college kid. Was it a cutting board? Whatever it was, I remember thinking it was a necessary utensil and I hated to submit to my fears.

[NYC]

19. Two more pet food recalls:

http://www.itchmo.com/red-flannel-large-breed-adult-formula-dry-dog-food-recalled-by-mars-petcare-2417

...50 lb bags of Red Flannel Large Breed Adult Formula dry dog food...has the potential to be contaminated with Salmonella, which can cause serious infections in dogs and cats, and, if there is cross contamination, in people, especially children, the aged, and people with compromised immune systems.

http://www.itchmo.com/mars-petcare-recalls-krasdale-gravy-dog-food-5-lb-bags-in-five-states-2416

Krasdale Gravy dry dog food...is being recalled because of a potential Salmonella contamination, which can cause serious infections in dogs and cats.

[athena]

22. It's not just dog food. The food you're eating may be poisonous, too.

Here is a deeply disturbing article from The Nation:
Poison for Profit

And had this "food grade" wheat gluten made its way to the US bakery and breakfast cereal manufacturers who use 530 million pounds annually, it could have created the largest and deadliest mass food poisoning in American history. Indeed, given the often silent, progressive nature of renal failure, and our regulatory and public health agencies' woeful inability to prevent, uncover, track or remedy such incidents, we cannot be certain that it already hasn't.

Hyperbole? Just days after pronouncing that there is "no acceptable level" of melamine and cyanuric acid in human food, the USDA and FDA suddenly recanted after learning that these industrial chemicals had also contaminated more than 23 million chickens and 56,000 hogs. Even as our pets were dying, the USDA/FDA issued a comically Orwellian joint press release proclaiming "no evidence of harm to humans" from eating melamine-tainted meat: "While the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention systems would have limited ability to detect subtle problems...no problems have been detected to date."



The explanation is simple. For decades our government has been dominated by a conservative ideology that claims to despise big government, abhor regulation and adhere to an unswerving faith in the infinite wisdom of the market. Rick Perlstein dubs this philosophy "E. Coli Conservatism," and in practice it is not only flawed but corrupt: a calculated conservative project intended to gut our regulatory systems in the interest of sheer corporate greed. We eat adulterated food not because we cannot adequately regulate the industry but because to do so would eat into the profits of the corporations our regulators serve.

In the six years since 9/11, food-borne pathogens and toxins have quietly killed ten times the number of Americans who died in the terrorist attacks. How many more Americans must conservatism kill before our leaders embrace a more responsible ideology?