Another line of thought about the recalled food.

We will never know.  Animals are disposable.

The media will report, oh maybe, a 1/3rd...if that.

    The media isn't doing a good job of keeping track of the total number of pets that have died. Individual reports indicate the number is much higher than 16. For example, there was report on ABC Thursday morning about one shelter in New Hampshire that lost seven cats from the tainted food. If you consider all the shelters across the country, the potential for death is staggering, not counting the pets lost by owners. etconnection.com is asking owners to report ets who are ill or deceased because of tainted food and they are now reporting over 1300 pets have died, and this is just one website that most pet owners don't even know about.

This is all so very sad....I have heard it's in the hundreds..But I am sure we will never know the real total

There was a database where people were self-reporting - last I checked the dog numbers were near 400 and I haven't looked at the cat numbers lately. I apologize but I seem to have lost the link and don't remember how I found it.

While the accuracy of that is likely to be thrown off by the fact that there's no way to correlate the deaths for sure at this point - that problem, in my mind is more than offset by the number of people whose pets died and as Sandra said, were simply buried with little thought, or with some regret but not even realizing that such a thing as a necropsy is possible on a pet. And many outside cats probably have been keeling over on the side of the road, vanishing without warning as cats often do.

Think of it - in the controlled tests TWENTY PERCENT of the tested animals died. That matches the anecdotal evidence better than the reported sixteen "confirmed" deaths (yeah, right).

I agree with you up to a point but I've seen a woman buying cheap, cheap dog food at the local small town grocery and load it into her brand new SUV.
 
I used to work with a g.c. supt. who makes twice what I do but he feeds Nutro Max, which is lower "grade" of what I feed. It may simply have to do with education on the part of the consumer. True, though, some people can barely afford to have a pet, let alone take them to a vet. But I've seen plenty of people with more money than me feed a cheaper grade. And they may not make the connection between the food and their pet.

AND, on another thread here, someone suggested that the dry food might be contaminated, too, but the FDA didn't have conclusive evidence and didn't want to cause unnecessary panic.  WHAT????????   If this was baby food, what would they do?

The news is not telling, and the news does not investigate. They just are reiterating talk.
 
Stated that 5 deaths have occurred due to this problem.  A veterinarian talked about how well balanced the dog and cat food is, while they alternated talking to that lady sueing about her loss of the cat...with tears dried on her cheeks.
 
I am pretty sure that the Canadian based business will pay off this indignation.  (look how they settled blackberry prob.)  They do not go out of business, but pay off.
 
Another report said, with all of the money they saved they will be paying out in sales losses.  My feeling is that they should be legally put out of business and pay out for the huge pet loss. 
 
Wonder how this will all pan out.
 
 

Anne, sadly probably the same thing.  Look at Celebrex and the other one (name escapes me) like it that are KNOWN to cause problems.  Still on the market.
 
And yeah, often the news does NOT investigate.  My ex was an investigative reporter.  He got fired from more jobs simply because he was passionate about investigating...yeah he's a butt, but when the bosses said "enough" and he didn't quite looking into soemthing HE believed in, he got the ax.  It's all about revenue, and investigative reporting pi$$es advertisers off and they loose money........it really sux.

There was a database where people were self-reporting - last I checked the dog numbers were near 400 and I haven't looked at the cat numbers lately. I apologize but I seem to have lost the link and don't remember how I found it.

 
This might be the database  [linkhttp://www.petconnection.com/blog/category/2007-food-recall/]http://www.petconnection.com/blog/category/2007-food-recall/[/link]  you are talking about,,,, and its really up in numbers now!

Okay, we are getting a number in the teens for dead pets. Yet on several different forums I have checked out, several have r eported that it has been reported that anywhere from 2 to 6 or 7 have been reported in their town, area. etc.

  This is from Pet connection;   
The Associated Press continues to report [linkhttp://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/P/PET_FOOD_RECALL?SITE=CTNHR&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT]16 dead pets,[/link] without even mentioning the possibility that there are hundreds if not thousands more. So does Newsweek, in this otherwise [linkhttp://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17774049/site/newsweek/]excellent piece on how to feed pets[/link], featuring the esteemed [linkhttp://www2.vet.ohio-state.edu/docs/cvm/action.lasso?-database=EMPLOYEE&-layout=Main&-response=detail.html&-recordID=56&-search]Dr. Tony Buffington[/link] of the Ohio State University College of Veterinary Medicine.
So far, both the Animal Medical Center (the "Mayo Clinic” of veterinary hospitals) and Banfield The Pet Hospital, with more than 600 locations all connected by a central database, have both [linkhttp://www.petconnection.com/blog/2007/03/24/pet-food-recall-what-are-the-numbers/]gone on the record[/link] saying there could be thousands of pets sickened or killed by recalled food.
So what's up, AP?
This afternoon, we got an e-mail from a person in the news department of a radio station, who pointed out to his boss that other media — such as USA Today and [linkhttp://abcnews.go.com/WNT/story?id=2974319]ABC News[/link] — have been reporting a potentially much higher death rate, and asked to change the AP's "rip-and-read” radio copy. He was told he could not, and until the AP decides to do more than parrot the FDA line, the story will remain largely under-reported. That means it will soon die.

    We'll probably never know the real numbers.
 
  Itchmo has put together a timeline starting with when Menu Foods switched suppliers for  gluten;  [linkhttp://www.itchmo.com/menu-foods-recall-fact-sheet]http://www.itchmo.com/menu-foods-recall-fact-sheet[/link]
  
   

Hopefully this whole thing will make pet-owners more concerned about what they feed their pets, and cause them to look for more healthier alternatives.

While it is true that there will be more deaths, possibly thousands, down the road as renal failures progress, the AP can only report verified numbers.  It's the AP, not the National Enquirer.  PetConnection is a blog that has no way of verifying anything.  Also, just because a pet dies or even dies from renal failure does not mean it was because of its food.  There is still a long way to go before this settles down.  Then there's the lawsuits.  Personally I feel that instead of suing Menu Foods which is only bad for pets (higher prices, more cheap ingredients) and only makes money for lawyers, people should be petitioning the government to apply better standards to pet foods as a whole and subsidize any cost increases to apply those standards.  Just my opinion.

http://www.itchmo.com/menu-foods-recall-fact-sheet

This site is an interesting example of sensationalism.  The calculate number of affected pets based on 80% of the 60 million recalled cans of food.  Where was it stated that 80% of the 60 million cans were actually consumed?  In their calculation of households affected they assume that all pet owners feed Menu Foods.  And of course they link to the statistics of the unverified numbers on PetConnection.

Personally I feel that instead of suing Menu Foods which is only bad for pets (higher prices, more cheap ingredients) and only makes money for lawyers, people should be petitioning the government to apply better standards to pet foods as a whole and subsidize any cost increases to apply those standards.  Just my opinion.

 
I agree! 
And while this whole thing is horrible.......its true that we don't know how many are really involved. THAT is why I started the thread for veterinary workers,,,,,,just to get an honest count on what our forum friends and professionals are seeing first hand.    I talked to our one "sick from the food" for sure patient today...and so far George is doing pretty well,,,although had to go to the vet for an UTI over the weekend.   Another dog came in on Sat. that had been eating the recalled food for months...he had vomitted a few times a week ago. but is fine.   HOPEFULLY we see no more,,,but other than that Pet Connection.....I don't hear about that many deaths.
I'm trying to remain hopeful,,,,,