The national recall of more than 90 brands of cat and dog food has triggered a flood of calls to area veterinarian offices from worried pet owners, and, at one Lynnwood clinic, reports of four cases of kidney failure suspected of being tied to the problem.
The cases involve three cats and one dog whose symptoms, diagnosis and medical history made veterinarians “very suspicious” that they may have been sickened by recalled pet food, Nicholas Nelson, medical director at Lynnwood-based Veterinary Specialty Care of Seattle, said Tuesday.
In each of these cases, pet owners had evidence that their pets had eaten some of the food included in the recall, he said.
One of the problems in trying to link pet illness to the recall is that kidney problems are very common in dogs and cats, he said. So the question is: Did the pet have kidney problems before the recall or did the food cause the problems?
“If the pet was perfectly healthy and then acutely ill and you then have kidney illness … it falls into the category of being highly suspicious,” Nelson said.
Ninety-five cat and dog food brands have been recalled by Menu Foods of Canada. The recall, issued Friday, came two weeks after nine cats died during routine company taste tests of its products, the Food and Drug Administration said.
The FDA so far has confirmed the deaths of 13 cats and one dog that had reportedly eaten the company’s “cuts and gravy” style pet food. The wet food was sold throughout North America under store brands carried by Wal-Mart, Kroger, Safeway and other large retailers, as well as private labels such as Iams, Nutro and Eukanuba.
Charlie Powell, a spokesman for the Washington State University College of Veterinary Medicine, said he fielded calls from worried pet owners across the nation until 2 a.m. Tuesday.
Their questions ranged from wanting to know the symptoms, such as vomiting, that indicate their pet may be sick from pet food to pets who are sick but haven’t eaten any of the brands of recalled food, he said.
“I’ve gotten calls, too, from people who at least may be looking to jump in on class-action litigation, animals that died, two, three or four months ago,” he said.
With the recall involving 60 million cans and pouches of food, “One has to ask the question: How many animals would have acute kidney failure naturally if there was not a contaminant in that food?
“I’m not taking anything away from an ill animal,” Powell said. “The point is, we don’t know yet what’s going on.”
Tom Koenig, a veterinarian at the Everett Veterinary Hospital, said that several dozen pet owners have called his office.
If a pet has been eating food on the recall list and become ill “we would certainly want to look at them,” he said.
Purrfect Pals, a shelter for 300 cats in Arlington, received at least 50 e-mails from supporters alerting them to the pet food recall, said Richard Huffman, executive director.
The organization began checking every can of food it had in stock last weekend and 20 to 25 cans of the brand names involved in the recall were found, he said.
But none matched the production dates that called them into question. “To be on the safe side, we threw them out,” he said.
Sandy Willis, president of the Washington State Veterinary Medical Association, said that checks are now being done on the ingredients of the recalled pet food to try to identify the problem.
“There’s something that’s causing damage severe enough in the kidney to shut them down fairly quickly,” she said.
That makes the animals either not urinate enough, or too much, she said. The animals can be treated with fluids.
Some animals respond to treatment in a few days, some in a week and some animals haven’t responded, Willis said.
The best advice for pet owners: Take your dog or cat to a veterinarian if they’re sick, she said. “I think we’ll get a lot of animals who get good health checks,” Willis said. “That’s a benefit.”
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Reporter Sharon Salyer: 425-339-3486 or salyer@heraldnet.com.
To learn more
For more information on the pet food recall, check the U.S. Food and Drug Administration Web site at www.fda.gov/opacom/7alerts.html; the American Veterinary Medical Association at avma.org, or the American Animal Hospital Association at aahanet.org.
Pet food recall
Menu Foods has announced a recall of a portion of the dog and cat food it manufactured between Dec. 3, 2006 and March 6. The recall affects the “cuts and gravy” style pet food in cans and pouches. Some products are sold under private-label brands.
Major brands affected by the cat food recall include: Iams, Science Diet Feline Savory Cuts Cans, Sophistacat.
For more information on cat food recalls, check the Menu Foods Web site: menufoods.com/recall/product_cat.html
Major brands affected by the dog food recall include: Iams, Eukanuba, Nutro and President’s Choice.
For a full list of affected dog foods, check the Menu Foods Web site at: menufoods.com/recall/product_dog.html
For more information, call 800-551-7392
Source: Menu Foods
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