Awful Truth About Pet Food...

Hey guys. I'm not sure exactly where to post this, but I really need a place to vent about this issue I'm having, ever since I found out about the ingredients in commercial cat/dog food.
I'm just warning you, the following information is very shocking and disturbing....

So a couple months ago, I found out online... That euthanized dogs and cats are sometimes taken from animal shelters/ vets offices, and then brought to meat rendering facilities...where they're turned into pet food...
I know, I know, it sounds unbelievable, but I've read multiple sources online about this whole thing, and I'm loosing my mind over it! In a lot of pet foods, you'll find ingredients such as "meat and bone meal," or "animal fat", that don't specify which species are used. Apparently, these ingredients can come from literally any mammal, and there's no law against them using cats and dogs.
Link:
https://www.dogfoodadvisor.com/dog-food-industry-exposed/euthanized-pets-dog-food/

I'm absolutely horrified by this. My family has this very old senior cat, whom I love dearly. We've had him since I was five, and I used to write little stories about him as a kid. For the majority of his life he's been eating Purina, and now he won't eat anything else. Seriously, I've tried so hard to get him to eat food without those vague ingredients, but it only resulted in him losing a lot of weight. My family members switched him back to Purina.
I..I don't know how to tell them about this. It may sound silly that I can't tell my family, but i have a lot of social anxiety, and it's hard to face them with this kind of information. I have no idea how they'd react; they'd probably think I'm crazy/ delusional.
I feel like I have no control...I feel hopeless and traumatized. Watching my beloved cat eat that stuff makes me sick, but I feel like there's nothing I can do. Mom won't let me order different brands for him, because of how much weight he lost...And even though we switched him back, he doesn't eat as much as he used to.
I feel like it's my fault! I feel like he might die sooner, all because of me!
And what happens if he gets really sick, and my parents decide to take him to a shelter? What will those people do with my cat when he dies?? Some animal shelters sell those bodies to meat rendering facilities, without telling the pet owners. I don't know who to trust.
This whole thing is just too much to handle. I wanna tell my parents, but my stupid social anxiety makes it so hard! Not a day goes by when I'm not stressing over this. I don't know what to do. I'm just miserable...
If you read this whole thing, thanks. I really needed to vent, cause I've been bottling it up for so long.

Hi @NiaraTiara and welcome to TCS!

I have heard of this and I think it's been discussed in our forums before.

Keep in mind, though, that every site that says something, another may say something else. We need to remember that the internet is full of people's interpretation of the facts and not necessarily the actual truth.  I notice that someone in the comments section has brought up some good points and referred to an FDA report which has information refuting the article.

What food is your cat being fed?

I do not remember the link or where I read about this issue but Nestle Purina has denied this.  Apparently it's true that euthanized pets as well as roadkill are rendered and sold for commercial use.   However, Nestle Purina has said that it would be a public relations nightmare to add such meat to its retail products because the public wouldn't stand for it.

I wonder if such meat isn't purchased by zoos for their own wild carnivores?

Hi there,

You see all kinds of things on the net that aren't true. To me it looked like it was just a few throwaway lines, we have no idea of the context of the interview because it wasn't shown in it's entirety. I agree with the previous poster, the comments that followed the article, particularly the FDA vid refuted it in ways which made a lot of sense. 

Your say your cat is a senior, he wouldn't have reached the age that he has without the proper care and a good part of that has to be diet. You don't say how old your cat is but as they get to old age it's best to feed them the food they enjoy.  

I think you really need to talk to your parents or a trusted adult with regards to your worries about the health of your cat. 

"I wonder if such meat isn't purchased by zoos for their own wild carnivores?"

I understand your zoos aren't regulated (as in anyone can set one up) but I doubt it would be as cheap or as easy than getting slaughtered meat from abattoirs, knackeries etc.  Our RSPCA was hurt badly by a scandal a couple of decades where they were selling dead dogs to vet schools for experimentation. It would kill your business to do this kind of thing.  

It isn't true. Purina doesn't put dead pets in their food. At all. I've seen this rumor before. Honestly I think that there are web sites out there that are written by people with the express purpose of either scaring them with plausible sounding things like this, or by people with an agenda to feed a particular type of food for pets. 

As for zoos, I bet that the diets that they feed the animals is pretty strict and species appropriate. Doubt there is ready made foods for zoo animals.

Not true at all. Its been proven false. Dead pets get thrown in the trash by vets or they are some times sent to labs if the vet is licenseed to sell. That's why its a bad idea to tell the vet to keep your dead pet. . . go home and bury it or arrange for cremation.


Also, look at all the nasty ingredients in HUMAN food.

There's no way to know what's in low quality pet food. We can safely assume that "rendered meats" probably do include everything from roadkill to euthanized pets. Sure, Big Pet Food is going to deny these things, but we have no proof one way or another. Just another reason not to feed low quality food.

http://www.slate.com/articles/healt...ats_from_shelters.html?wpsrc=sh_all_dt_tw_bot

Just because a lot of places online say it, doesn't make it true. I mean, this is the same place where people were convinced you could have infinite chocolate if you cut it a certain way. It's correct that legally, pet food can include cat or dog. But it's very unlikely any large well known company would do this because they would simply not be able to hide it, and once found out, the company would probably crumble.
Now, I personally still avoid unnamed meat sources, since I like knowing exactly what I'm feeding my cat. A company is probably not naming the meat because they are using different kinds of meat. For example, beef, pork and chicken. But it may be that they're all in such small amounts, so saying 'meat' means they can put it higher on the ingredient list. It also means if beef goes super cheap that month, they can increase the amount of beef and reduce the other meat products, but still call it the same formula. That's the more likely reason, not cat and dog. It's still not great because if you're cat develops a sensitivity you'll have no idea what to; however, if your cat is a senior, he's probably not going to develop a sensitivity at this point, or if he does its probably easy to find a new food. The fact that it's legal to include cat or dog is still a reason to avoid it I suppose, but I really wouldn't stress about it as it's infinitely unlikely from Purina. As for telling your parents, I'd just point it out in passing, as an interesting tidbit, but since you don't need to switch foods, you can leave it as a tidbit, and let them come to their own conclusions. "So I learned the other day that it's legal to put cat and dog meat in pet food" and leave it at that. Also if anything bad happens to your cat it's not you're fault, you aren't the one feeding him. But rest assured he won't end up in pet food.

Laura Mae said:

As for zoos, I bet that the diets that they feed the animals is pretty strict and species appropriate. Doubt there is ready made foods for zoo animals.

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oh, there are ready made foods for zoo animals. Ever heard of monkey chow? It's made by Purina! But zoos do feed fresh meat and veggies for the most part. Premade is just supplemental.

moorspede said:

Our RSPCA was hurt badly by a scandal a couple of decades where they were selling dead dogs to vet schools for experimentation. It would kill your business to do this kind of thing.  

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Wait, really? Why would that bother people. As long as they were euthanized for valid reasons, that's a reasonable thing to do. Vet students need to learn on something, I'd rather the first animal they cut up not be a live one.

moorspede said:

Our RSPCA was hurt badly by a scandal a couple of decades where they were selling dead dogs to vet schools for experimentation. It would kill your business to do this kind of thing.  

Click to expand...

Wait, really? Why would that bother people. As long as they were euthanized for valid reasons, that's a reasonable thing to do. Vet students need to learn on something, I'd rather the first animal they cut up not be a live one.

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People considered it a huge breach of trust, it brings up all sorts of ethical questions, the main being that if they are profiting from putting more animals to sleep than they should? Also, it was done in an atmosphere of secrecy, people who are donating are also people who may be put off by vivisection or they may be put off by the fact the RSPCA is profiting from it etc  

. . .people who are donating are also people who may be put off by vivisection. . .

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Vivisection is dissecting a LIVE animal.

Kinda weird, American shelters sell dead animals to lab supply or whoever wants the bodies all the time. Doesn't seem to bother anyone.

They did a DNA test on pet food, and found traces of euthanization drug, but no dog or cat DNA. They concluded that the euth drug was from horses or maybe even cows who were chemically euthanized. It's not allowed to feed animals others of their same species due to disease risk. For instance, they can feed cows chicken parts, and chickens cow parts, but no chickens to chickens and no cows to cows (especially cows! Because of Mad Cow disease. Also sheep, because of Scrapie). That's something that is pretty well enforced because of the human health risk. So there may be rendered cats and dogs in cattle feed, but not in dog or cat food.

The meat industry is pretty disgusting when you really look into it, but Americans like cheap meat so i don't know what else can be done :/. Nothing goes to waste.

. . .people who are donating are also people who may be put off by vivisection. . .

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Vivisection is dissecting a LIVE animal.
 

Really? Oh yuck.