National Pet Journalist Steve Dale’s 9/8/10 column, found in newspapers nationwide, told pet owners that “Pet foods do not contain eggs”. Wrong. Better than 80% of all pet foods contain egg. Now why would a national pet journalist tell pet owners misleading information about pet foods?
Steve Dale’s story was titled “Pet food recalls giving owners the jitters.” The first sentence of the second paragraph states “Pet foods do not contain eggs.” http://www.latimes.com/sns-pets-food-recall-questions,0,6318112.story
This statement, as most pet owners are aware of, is false; the majority of pet foods contain eggs. In fact, even recalled eggs are heading to pet food. A MSNBC.com story on the recent egg recall states “The producers responsible for a recall of some 550 million potentially tainted eggs have found another outlet for the inventory that just keeps coming: They’ll turn them into liquid eggs used in everything from cookies and cakes to egg substitutes and pet food.” http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/38851155/ns/health-food_safety/
So why would pet journalist Steve Dale make such a statement? It could be the contact he used for his story; Dr. Tony Buffington, veterinary nutritionist at Ohio State University of Veterinary Medicine-Columbus (although this doesn’t make sense nor is it an excuse for irresponsible and misleading information to pet owners).
Dr. Buffington told Dale “in truth, the odds of salmonella contamination may be higher if you prepare your own pet foods.” Dr. Buffington as well seems to say that pet owner concern of recent pet food Salmonella recalls are emotionally based; “aversive conditioning”.
Yes Dr. Buffington, pet owners have been conditioned to avoid pet foods that sicken and kill our pets. My guess would be if a food sickened or killed your family you’d be just as emotional and experience your own ‘aversive conditioning’. However, I’d like to see the science you base your home prepared pet food is of greater risk than commercial pet food statement on. Care to share that with pet owners? The continuous unfounded attack on home prepared pet food is getting very old.
A phone call to Ms. S. Deibler, Steve Dale’s editor, had little results. I informed Ms. Deibler of the misleading and incorrect quote in Steve Dale’s story; she wasn’t very concerned. When I asked for a retraction/correction to the statement, she informed me that would be Dale’s sole decision. At that point I asked her “as editor, is it acceptable to you for your journalists to publish incorrect information?” She agreed for me to email her evidence to prove that eggs are a common pet food ingredient, and that recalled eggs will end up in some pet foods. She stated she would forward my complaint to Mr. Dale, along with my contact information should he decide to contact me. I’ll keep you posted.
My thanks to Cathy C. for her alerting me to this issue. Our team of determined pet owners will keep everyone on their toes!
Wishing you and your pet(s) the best,
Susan Thixton
Pet Food Safety Advocate
Author, Buyer Beware
Co-Author Dinner PAWsible
TruthaboutPetFood.com
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