2 articles: Clues to pet food recall & Cornell U. checking on second contaminant

[rumpel]

again kudos to howl911 for these articles they also post the a link to a comprehensive and up to date list of all the recalled items.
http://howl911.com/

Clues to pet food recall traced to Chinese city

By David Barboza
Published: April 11, 2007

XUZHOU, China: U.S. investigators looking into the tainted pet food that killed at least 16 cats and dogs, sickened thousands of pets and led to a recall in North America have traced the problem to this bustling eastern city.

Xuzhou is the home of Xuzhou Anying Biologic Technology Development, a small agricultural products trader that U.S. regulators say was the source of the wheat gluten, distributed to major pet food suppliers in North America, that was at some point adulterated with a toxic chemical that sickened or killed the animals.

Although U.S. and Chinese regulators are still investigating the matter, this city is already yielding clues about how the gluten may have been contaminated, and also exposing some of the challenges faced by China's emergence as a global agricultural products supplier.

If proof is found that melamine was intentionally blended into the wheat gluten, it could be a huge setback for the agricultural trade between the United States and China, which is already battling a reputation for lax food safety standards.

http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/04/11/asia/gluten.php

Chinese criticized in pet food probe

By Karen Roebuck
TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Wednesday, April 11, 2007

The Chinese government and the company that supplied a contaminated ingredient are slowing the federal investigation into the nationwide recall of pet food, a U.S. Food and Drug Administration official said Tuesday.

Researchers, however, are making strides toward uncovering what has sickened cats and dogs nationwide. A lead scientist said yesterday he is convinced a second contaminant was in the wheat gluten, which FDA and independent researchers said was laced with high amounts of melamine, a chemical used in plastics.

Dr. Richard Goldstein, associate professor of medicine at Cornell University's College of Veterinary Medicine and a kidney specialist who is researching the outbreak's health impact on pets, said he and other researchers saw what they believe is a second contaminant in the gluten and the urine of infected animals, but have yet to identify it. Cornell is among labs working with the FDA.

"The concerted effort now is to identify what else is in there, and what's in the crystals" of infected animals' urine and tissue, Goldstein said.

http://pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/news/rss/s_502101.html

[nicknameless]

1. The risks for both human and pet food contamination are frightening.

Thanks for posting this

K&R

[kurth]

2. Best to ban all Chinese food imports

No telling how many people have been harmed by all the crap they've been sending us.

[rumpel]

5. I think the issue is not only food from China

to me this means - anywhere along the manufacturing stage food can be contaminated - it just happened to be from China this time - but we have to start regulating and really inspecting our food processing -

This could have been prevented if there were random inspections done at the port or even at the plant -

Having tainted food sold on the market for 5 months means there was absolutely no inspection during those 5 months.

The wonderful homeland security - where is it?

[Shallah Kali]

13. Menu Foods plant was inspected once about 10 years ago. FDA still hasn't revealed the human food con

contamination - after repeated denials saying that the gluten was only sold to pet food makers boston globe published this March 3rd
http://www.boston.com/business/globe/articles/2007/04/03/was_human_food_tainted_too/

Was human food tainted too?
Suspect gluten went to plants that make products for people, FDA says

By Diedtra Henderson, Globe Staff | April 3, 2007

ROCKVILLE, Md. -- Tainted wheat gluten that triggered a massive nationwide pet food recall also ended up in processing plants that prepare food consumed by people, the Food and Drug Administration said yesterday. While agency leaders offered assurances that the nation's food supply remains safe, they said they cannot yet completely rule out contamination of human food by the suspect wheat gluten, which contained melamine, a chemical found in plastics and pesticides.


According to import records, the wheat gluten was shipped to the United States from Nov. 3, 2006 to Jan. 23 of this year and contained "minimal labeling" to indicate whether it was intended for humans or animals. The vast majority went to pet food manufacturers and distributors, according to the FDA. But some of the processing plants that remain under FDA scrutiny make both human and pet food.

[rumpel]

3. welcome

we may yet find out what went wrong -

[nicknameless]

7. I surely hope so.

[lonestarnot]

4. Thanks for posting this.

[rumpel]

6. you're welcome n/t

[dalloway]

8. makes me think of the Walmartization of organic food

I heard that Walmart was going to start sourcing organic products from China.

HAAAAAA! That makes me feel real secure /snark off.

I stopped buying Stonyfield yogurt when I found out, due to short domestic supply, their corporate management started getting some of the organic ingredients from China. Not only don't I trust the integrity of such a supply, I think it is wrong to burn fossil fuels to ship strawberries half way around the world. Just sayin' ....

[gulfcoastliberal]

9. USDA certified Chinese poultry plants for US export

Is Your Chicken from China?

The processed chicken you now buy in the United States may have come from China. The Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) announced a final rule on April 20, 2006, that made China eligible to export processed poultry products. The likelihood is that this rule will eventually make people sick. Although the FSIS inspected processing plants in China and found them to meet guidelines, will there be frequent enough inspections by the FSIS to ensure guidelines continue to be met? Are there risks associated with the Avian flu, which is currently a threat in China?

It is too late to change the rule. It is final. It does not mean, however, that we as consumers need to buy poultry that was processed in China. Ask before you buy.

http://foodpoisoning.pritzkerlaw.com/archives/food-safety-is-your-chicken-from-china.html

[rumpel]

10. You know...

I was wondering about the frozen chicken you can sometimes buy in bags at the supermarket - these days I find some of them have the blood not properly drained - I cook and cook and the... sorry it's gross. which kind of gives me second thoughts buying it ever again...

Imports - could be...

[rumpel]

11. Oh my thanks for the link

risk based inspections? are they that underfunded?

[leftchick]

12. buy locally

I buy everything I am able to locally.

[selfexploits]

14. About Purina Beneful: Please Read!

Oh man, what does it take for someone to be allowed to post on this website?

Sorry for the relative irrelevance this post is to the thread, but I signed up for this forum because I noticed there was a thread on Purina Beneful a few days ago (http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x609440) and I have a few things to say about it. (I kept thinking, "HOW DO I WARN THEM?" when I was trying to figure out how to post on here.) "Thankfully" I'd consider myself a Democrat and vaguely keep up with politics, so there should be a good number of topics that interest me on this site. However, the point of this was for me to say that YES, I believe there is proof that there is something wrong with Beneful and that it should be recalled. What proof is that? My dog died earlier this year a few days after eating Beneful. Of course, that in itself is not enough proof that there's a connection at all. But consider this. My dog HAD eaten Beneful previously, and liked it (apparently it's like incredibly unhealthy dog junk food). We did switch around her dry food, so she didn't eat it regularly. But at the beginning of this year, she started a new bag, finished the first bowl very quickly as expected, but refused to eat after that bowl. (And no she did not eat any of the recalled pet food.) A few days later, she developed the same symptoms as listed in this Snopes article (http://www.snopes.com/critters/crusader/beneful.asp), and died the next morning. This took less than a week. At first I didn't think anything suspicious of it, but that was before I came across the article. Now I really do believe there is something wrong with that stuff, whatever it is, as the death of my dog was incredibly sudden and unexpected, and her symptoms coincide with that of other dogs. There is other evidence suggesting something wrong with the food, but if you want tons more anecdotes having to do with this, read this article http://www.doggybling.com/newsarticle.php?id=1101. Make sure to check out the multiple links on the bottom of the page to articles dating from the beginning of this year.

This food not being recalled by either Purina or Beneful is irritating the hell outta me, so I've been trying to post as many places online that refer to Beneful and the problem. So if any of you know users Matcom or Squatch or anyone else who've said they also feed Beneful to their dog, please inform them of this for their information. I ain't allowed to send private messages on this site yet, and I really want everyone to be at least aware of this information before they continue feeding Beneful to their dogs. I'm glad to hear that no one else has a sick or dead dog yet, but I really, really, really do not want more dogs to possibly die this way. My dog died way too suddenly and unnecessarily.

If anyone has any questions, please message me (if you can) and I'd be happy to talk to you about it (as macabre the topic might be). Thank you for your time.

[uppityperson]

15. Thank you and welcome to DU. Off to read it all now.

Edited to say that you need a certain number of posts before others can pm you. You can also put info in your "personal info" found under Options.