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This claim needs to be taken with a huge grain of salt. This is a pet-owner reported list of affected animals, and many pet owners are absolutely clueless about the fact that kidney failure is extremely common in both cats and dogs. Pretty much all cats will get it if they don't die of something else first. And there are many common products and plants that are commonly found in homes, which can produce sudden, acute kidney failure in cats and dogs. I participate in an online group for owners of cats with kidney failure, and there have been many new members every single week for many years. Most just recently learned their cat was in kidney failure, when actually the condition had been well underway for years and just finally produced acute symptoms.

With all the publicity about the contaminated food, tens of thousands of people are now rushing off to the vet at the slightest sign of Fluffy or Fido being a little under the weather, or even without any signs but because the animal ate one of the affected brands (though the owners usually didn't have the containers still around and had no way of knowing whether the food had actually been from one of the recalled batches). Even if none of the pets had ever consumed any of the contaminated food, with this huge surge in the number of pets being brought into vets, there was invariably going to be a huge surge in the numbers of pets diagnosed with kidney failure. Many owners imagine that kidney failure is an unusual event in a pet's life, and are claiming their pet's new diagnosis or sudden death is due to the contaminated food, when there's really no evidence to support the claim. I'd put a lot more stock in the numbers being reported by the Veterinary information Network, which currently stand at a total of 471 cases, 104 of which have died, 59 of which have survived and are no longer requiring veterinary care, and 308 still undergoing treatment. With vets reporting 104 deaths and this owner-reported database claiming 2400 deaths, obviously somebody's not counting right, and it's more likely the pet owners than the vets.

>This claim needs to be taken with a huge grain of salt. This is a pet-owner reported list of affected animals, and many pet owners are absolutely clueless about the fact that kidney failure is extremely common in both cats and dogs. <

Yes it is. I have run a dog related list for 10 years and kidney failure is a common cause of death in dogs as well. It is connected to heart failure as well as old age.

It is also very common for our list to receive alot of "scare" emails that have claims of pet poisoning from one thing or another. The food one is the most common that I see.

I never forward them to my list members until I have checked them out to make sure they are for real and official. Over the years I have had only a handful of these types of emails pan out. This food recall was one of them along with the diamond food recall, the grape/raisin warning and the cocoa mulch warning.

People have gripes against drug companies & food companies. Some are PETA types, some are raw food feeders who think that the dog food manufacturers are the devil incarnate. Some are anti-drug/chemical people and some are pet owners who have had a pet die and want either someone to blame or someone to sue. I am not surprised that many of these types will come out of the woodwork now. One of their methods of attack is to start these warning emails hoping to damage a company's bottom line. Alot of people see nothing wrong with this as they have the liberal viewpoint that companies have deep pockets and deserve it. They fail to see the connection between a company losing money and the little guy losing his or her job. Or the consumer paying the price in higher costs. Some people think these emails should be forwarded before they are checked out as they may "save just one pet's life".

I just had one of these email forwards about a flea product. I think every flea product and heartworm product has had one of these claims made. The dog was 11 years old and died of cancer. The owner claimed it was from a flea product that she put on the dog just days before. A very fast growing cancer. Of course the dog's body was cremated, no formal complaint filed with the EPA and no necropsy done at the vet but people were to forward to everyone they knew.

I believe I have a responsibility to the companies involved in these emails and to my list members. I often call or email the companies involved and just ask them about it. When I forward a warning or recall I want my list members to know that the information is valid and not just hysterical junk.

I still occasionally see the killer clorox bleach email, the swiffer one & the killer febreeze too. And the media loves to whip people up into a frenzy over this stuff. People get hysterical.

Someone dropped the ball here and I think as sad as it is that people lost their pets, the more scary scenario is that this could have easily made it into the human food supply. If our pet's food supply isn't safe neither is ours.