Catfood for thought

We have two beloved cats, Kit and Black Jack, and I just found out that I have been feeding them food that could kill them. Two days ago my Mom and I were reading the paper and she started reading aloud an article … now honestly this usually annoys me, but it was about people losing their pets to some odd illness, so I started to listen. We learned that the sickness was kidney failure and that it was caused by tainted food. Then she said that there was a recall. Now I have heard about countless recalls and I always check the can or package and invariably find that we don’t have the serial number… but this time things were different. Like so many Americans, I found out that what I thought were Max Cat and Natural Choice were really Nutro Products. We were very calm at first and then furious when we realized the chunks of meat in gravy that our cats loved was actually full of contaminated wheat gluten. The thing that made us the craziest was that it was ALL the food. We kept thinking we could check the little pouches for some kind of date or number or factory but there was nothing. I took the food back to our neighborhood pet store and they were awesome. They immediately gave us a refund and said it was a serious situation and to keep a close eye on both animals. The good news is that even though Kit has a rash and has been a little lethargic our vet said she is fine. He told us they’d already had a case of renal failure in our local clinic and that there was a big fear that the number of animals affected is actually much higher than has been reported.

My thoughts are with pet owners who have not been as lucky as my family and I am sure many of you wonder if this horrible situation could have been prevented. I also wonder if a lot of people were as surprised as I was to find out that the so-called high-end pet food I was feeding my animals was the exact same food found in every can or package no matter what the name. There’s a famous line often attributed to PT Barnun which goes, “There’s a sucker born every minute.” I guess in my case he was absolutely right.

Comments

hi, i have 2 cats who weirdly enough look a lot like yours. can you please tell me what the article said in specifics - as in is it just the nutro brand or an ingredient common to other brands too? i m really worried. thanks.

I hear you on the "but I feed my cat the GOOD food thing". I just realized that Science Diet, the stuff that my vet recommends and you can't even buy in regular grocery stores was included on that list. Luckily I don't feed her the wet kind of food. It is a scary situation. Glad your pets are doing fine.