Category: Pet Food Recall

Chinese officials have detained two managers from the two companies that exported melamine contaminated wheat flour. (As mentioned previously, these companies were actually selling tainted wheat flour, but representing it as wheat gluten and rice protein concentrate.)

See video interview with one of the detainees, Tian Feng, manager of Binzhou Futian Biology Technology.

I hope this actually signals a change in China, but they have a long way to go. Spiking ingredients with melamine isn’t uncommon. In the news today, Chinese farmed catfish are being banned in Mississippi because they tested positive for two banned antibiotics—ciprofloxacin and enrofloxacin.

You can find out much more on the recall on my Pet Food Recall Archive Page.

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First it was tainted, salvage pet food being fed to hogs and chickens, now it’s fish farmed for human consumption being fed fish meal made with melamine tainted ingredients.

It’s also become clear that, the tainted “wheat gluten” and “rice protein concentrate” that has killed and sickened so many pets is actually just wheat flour. It’s pathetic.

ChemNutra, the U.S. company that supplied the melamine tainted materials to pet food companies, also sold contaminated material to the fish meal maker. When asked, ChemNutra said they chose not to include the shipment to the fish meal company in their April 2nd recall of materials sold to pet food companies because they “co-brokered” the deal and didn’t actually “sell” the tainted material.

You can find out much more on the recall on my Pet Food Recall Archive Page.

Due to the possibility of cross-contamination, Drs. Foster & Smith Lamb & Brown Rice Dry Adult Dog Food is being recalled. Check link for specific lot numbers.

You can find out much more on the recall on my Pet Food Recall Archive Page.

SmartPak Canine is recalling its LiveSmart Adult Lamb & Brown Rice. (scroll to bottom) It tested positive for melamine even though it is not supposed to contain “rice protein concentrate, wheat gluten, or any of the ingredients on FDA’s import watch list.”

You can find out much more on the recall on my Pet Food Recall Archive Page.

Renal tubule blocked by crystals.

Two months into the pet food recall, scientists weren’t sure why melamine and cyanuric acid, which are not thought to be very toxic, were killing pets. Now scientists at the University of Guelph in Ontario, Canada, may have found the answer as to how the contaminants in the tainted pet foods cause renal failure. Perry Martos mixed melamine and cyanuric acid together and it almost immediately formed crystals like those found in the kidneys of animals that died. Unfortunately, these crystals appear to be very insoluble.

On April 20th, I wrote that researchers have identified three melamine by-products in the tissue and urine of affected animals.(article via PetConnection) Scientists at the University of Guelph, Ontario, Cornell’s College of Veterinary Medicine, and Michigan State University’s Diagnostic Center for Population & Animal Health have found cyanuric acid (used as a stabilizer for pool chlorine), amilorine, and amiloride.

Michigan State University’s Diagnostic Center for Population & Animal Health has photographs of these crystals in the kidney of an affected dog and micrographs of these crystals clogging the renal tubules of the kidney. It makes it easier to understand what these crystals did when you see these images. (Note: At the time these pathology slides were prepared, it was still thought that aminopterin was the contaminant.)

You can find out much more on the recall on my Pet Food Recall Archive Page.
Continue reading “Pet Food Recall: Melamine & Cyanuric Acid Combo Deadly”