Please folks, don't assume that the food on the shelves is safe. Know what foods are on the list. You can print out a 7 page summary at the top of this page, in the "Files to Download" section. The Summary is #1 "The Master List of all Brands Recalled Pet Food Summary". This is something you can take to the store with you.
If you want to check online, the FDA site lets you search by brand name, here: http://www.fda.gov/oc/opacom/hottopics/petfood.html Click on "Search combined list of recalled pet food products"
And if you want to check stores near you, see the "Volunteers help get food off shelves" section at the bottom of this page. (It's at the bottom of every page on this site, so if you click on an individual post, you can always find it by scrolling down.)
Cat survives eating recalled food, so far
Months after a nationwide recall, Andy Tonetti bought tainted cat food from the Save Mart in Angels Camp.After eating only six pouches of Iams Select Bites, 14-year-old Rasputin was hiding in dark spaces, gagging and losing weight from dehydration.
Six days after Tonetti's purchase on May 29, a veterinarian said the family pet had acute renal failure, the ailment the U.S. Food and Drug Administration warned about at the time of the recall.
"I saw a sale, thought 'Good, we'll get that,'" Tonetti said, noting that his wife had sent him to get Fancy Feast. "Geez, we got the death box."
Ten days later, Save Mart could not explain why a single box of recalled pet food was on the shelf, especially after so much publicity about an industrial chemical that had been added to Chinese wheat gluten used by pet food manufacturers.
...
"We will do whatever we need to do to make it right, or as right as we can make it, given the situation," Alicia Rockwell, Save Mart's communications manager, said Friday afternoon. "We are so sorry."
...But the only change in the indoor cat's life was his food, so the culprit seemed clear. After a bit of research, the Tonettis learned that the Iams pouches Andy Tonetti bought had been out of circulation for weeks.
Their veterinarian urged them to save the cat, and faxed documentation to the pet food company, which is expected to pay Rasputin's bills.
"Iams told me I'm the first one to call after the recall," said Heidi Tonetti, adding that the company seemed eager to take care of the situation.
Kurt Iverson, a spokesman for Proctor & Gamble Pet Care, which makes Iams pet foods, declined to comment on the Tonettis' claim.
The Tonettis assumed other cats, and perhaps some dogs, might be in danger as well. They said the manager at Save Mart seemed to think they were crazy, but passed their complaint along to corporate headquarters.
...
She said Save Mart took their complaint seriously and performed a computerized check of its sales, determining that one recalled box of Iams Select Bites was sold May 29.
She said all Save Marts, including the store in Angels Camp, pulled pet food off their shelves when recalls of more than 150brands were announced March 15, leaving large gaps in their inventory.
Save Mart will take steps to make sure recalled items don't get past cashiers in the future, perhaps by adjusting computerized scanning systems, Rockwell said.
She could only speculate on how the single box of Iams ended up on the shelf. Perhaps it was misplaced in another part of the store, she said, then was returned to the shelf by a stock clerk.
"The product has been out of the distribution channel for over 10 weeks and there is none left at the warehouse or at the manufacturer," Rockwell said.
Andy Tonetti, a winemaker at Ironstone Vineyards, recalled seeing only one box of Iams on the shelf. He said he chose it because it was marked down. He did not have a receipt, but recalled paying about $4.
...The black and white cat is purring again, they said, but will need regular checkups and a special diet.
"He's going to be damaged," Heidi Tonetti said.
This item saddens me tremendously. The same think happened to a friend of my daughter, except the cat died. The vet said the cat's kidneys were "choked" with crystals. Same product. Iams Select Bites, bought in May in an upscale supermarket. These stores need to be so much more careful.
June 10, 2007 10:40 AM
3 comments:
This item saddens me tremendously. The same think happened to a friend of my daughter, except the cat died. The vet said the cat's kidneys were "choked" with crystals. Same product. Iams Select Bites, bought in May in an upscale supermarket. These stores need to be so much more careful.
Susan, thank you so much for posting this. I'm going to put your comment in the main post, so people realize it's not an isolated incident.
It's just so heartbreaking that pets are still getting sick and dying from recalled products.
What state did your friend buy it in?
Hello Kim. It was bought in CT (northwestern corner, near NY and MA borders) at a "summer people" grocery store. My daughter's friend doesn't shop there, but she just ran in for cat food, because it's near her apartment. She feels so guilty because she though a "nice store like that would have checked." So she didn't check the recall list herself.
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