A new pet food (deadly) record…29 weeks

Guess what FDA’s been doing THIS ENTIRE YEAR (and some of last year)?

What should have taken days, took 29 weeks for FDA and Smucker Big Heart Brands to properly investigate. The previous 21 week investigation failure record has been shattered.

The previous investigation failure:

In November 2018 a dog food recall was announced by two pet food brands made by the same manufacturer – the cause was excess vitamin D in the vitamin premix. Over the following twenty-one weeks, 9 more recalls from two different pet food manufacturers were announced for the same excess vitamin D cause. The FDA investigation took twenty-one weeks to properly trace the adulterated vitamin premix resulting in the death of many dogs.

Twenty-one weeks to investigate an adulterated ingredient felt like the FDA’s Center for Veterinary Medicine (CVM) couldn’t get any worse at their job…until now.

The new investigation failure:

In December 2019, the J. M. Smucker Big Heart Brands pet food manufacturer announced a recall of Special Kitty canned cat food. The FDA notice did not disclose a reason for the recall (which was extremely unusual). Later we learned the cause of the canned cat food recall was “due to excessive level of choline chloride in product“.

A pet food company is required by law to notify the FDA within 24 hours of their knowledge of a health concern with a pet food. With an issue like this – a Class I recall – the FDA typically performs an inspection at the pet food plant implementing a trace forward and trace backwards investigation. Trace forward is performed to investigate where the contaminated pet food was shipped to – to prevent it from being sold to consumers. Trace backwards is to determine the cause of the adulteration, such as the source of the contaminated ingredient. As follow up procedure, once the supplier of the contaminated ingredient is determined – another trace forward and backwards investigation is performed at the supplier facility to determine what other manufacturers received the adulterated ingredient and if need be recall those pet foods.

With this December 2019 recall, Smucker Big Heart Brands was the co-packer for Walmart (Special Kitty is a Walmart brand). The FDA would have trace forward investigated at the Smucker pet food plant what Walmart distribution centers received the recalled pet foods. This is done to assure the distribution of the adulterated pet food is stopped. FDA would (should) thoroughly trace backward investigate what batches of pet food included the adulterated ingredient – assumed to be included in the vitamin premix – to assure all adulterated cat foods were recalled. A proper FDA investigation would also perform a trace backwards to learn the supplier of the choline chloride ingredient and the supplier of the ingredient/premix would be investigated to learn how the problem occurred and what (if any) other pet foods received the problem ingredient/premix.

But…

Twenty-nine weeks after the Smucker Big Heart Brands Special Kitty recall, the manufacturer announced another canned cat food recall for the exact same cause. This recall was for another brand they manufacture (possibly manufactured at the same plant as the Special Kitty pet food). In July 2020, Big Heart recalled Natural Balance canned cat food for “elevated levels of choline chloride“. Unfortunately, this recall notice stated pets got sick from the adulterated cat food; “The Company has received reports of adverse reactions.”

Suspicious facts:

1. Both Special Kitty and Natural Balance are manufactured by Smucker Big Heart Brands.
2. All of the recalled cat foods were manufactured during the same time frame; Special Kitty recalled cat foods were manufactured between July 17, 2018 through October 7, 2018 (based on a 3 year from Best By date to manufacture). The Natural Balance recalled cat foods were manufactured in August 2018.
3. Since 2007, there has not been another recall for elevated levels of choline chloride; these are the only 2 in the past 13 years.

Unless some sort of freakish coincidence happened, the facts seem to indicate that both Smucker manufactured cat foods – Special Kitty and Natural Balance – used the same vitamin premix that included the elevated levels of choline chloride. (Freedom of Information Act requests have been sent to FDA to determine if this was a highly unusual coincidence or if this was a pet food investigation failure. Unfortunately these requests often take months or years for FDA to provide. When received, they will be shared.)

The facts known today indicate that FDA and Smucker Big Heart Brands failed miserably in investigating the first recall. From the first recall on December 5, 2019 to the second recall on July 3, 2020 was twenty-nine long and probably deadly weeks. In other words, FDA’s Center for Veterinary Medicine took this entire year and some of last year to properly trace an adulterated ingredient/premix.

Why did it take FDA and Smucker Big Heart Brands twenty-nine weeks to determine these two cat foods included the same adulterated ingredient/vitamin premix? How many pets were sickened or died in that time frame?

To be fair, an FDA trace forward and backwards investigation can be influenced by the cooperation – or lack of cooperation – of the pet food manufacturer. Smucker Big Heart Brands could have hindered the investigation with poor record keeping or by being less than forthcoming with FDA with existing records. BUT…it is the responsibility of FDA to muddle through any and all challenges presented to them during an investigation. The failure of this investigation lies with FDA.

If any pet owner had a cat get sick from the Natural Balance cat food recalled in July 2020, please contact me. Your stories will be compiled and shared with those that need to hear the outcome of this FDA failure (members of Congress and the Office of Inspector General). This letter of complaint will be shared on the website in the future for pet owners to share with their government representatives.

Should any pet owner wish to express to FDA their sentiments on this investigation failure, you can email FDA Center for Veterinary Medicine at: AskCVM@fda.hhs.gov

There is no excuse for this type of failure. All involved should be held accountable for their actions (or lack of action). Perhaps in the future we need to see lawsuits include regulatory authorities. Just maybe – if regulatory authorities faced lawsuits for failed investigations – those performing investigations might bother to do them properly (resulting in pets lives being saved).

Wishing you and your pet(s) the best,

Susan Thixton
Pet Food Safety Advocate
TruthaboutPetFood.com
Association for Truth in Pet Food

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