Wellness' Response to Carrageenan

[allisa]

. I don t trust what they say . Of course they ll say that not because it s a cheap filler so we can make more money. I stay away from all carrageen period.

Sorry, my post was in response to these.

 

 

[allisa]

 
I feed one brand with carrageenan(Merrick)      My two love the duck so I keep it in the rotation.    I also feed FF classic turkey & giblet which has the controversial vitamin k.     Its hard to avoid these ingredients when you want to keep your cost down and try and keep variety in a rotation.    I'd love to feed just tiki cat and natures variety but I think my two would get bored.     Also when I feed the shredded chickens like Tiki or Weruva it doesn't fill them up so I have to feed more.     They are young yet so I hope as they get older I will be able to adjust what they eat. 

I'm so glad I just read this. Sorry, slight thread hijack, but I've just recently decided to stop feeding my cat Tikki Cat and Weruva because he was eating plenty of it and still seemed hungry, urinated a lot (there is a lot of juice and water in there -though the meat is very nice ). I'm not really sure what it is about those brands, but something was just not working right with him - as you say - he never seemed to feel full. Though it is excellent that they don't have carrageenan. I think it's a bit unfair to accuse people across the board of being paranoid (this not directed to Lokhismom) about this ingredient. I base my decicions on personal experience as well as reading (both other's experiences and research). I used to get family members telling me I was "crazy" and that I don't have food sensitivities, that it is just in my mind. I totally appreciate all of the information on this thread but I take slight offense to the suggestion of paranoia. I used to blindly believe everything I was told but now I know better. Forgive me, but I just had to add that.

 

[vmurph]

That's the same response I got from Merrick. Unfortunately, they left out some important information.

By the way, the degraded form is called Poligeenan, which is carcinogenic and banned for use in all foods...pet and human.

The part these pet food companies don't tell you (or don't realize?) is that heat, digestive enzymes, acid, and bacteria can degrade the carrageenan, thus turning it into the dangerous form, poligeenan.

Also, even the so-called "healthy" form (carrageenan) is found to cause inflammation in the gut, both in animals and humans.

This information is posted on Jackson Galaxy's website. You can read the very informative article here:

http://www.littlebigcat.com/nutrition/carrageenan-a-common-pet-food-additive/

 

[felineempathy]

That's the same response I got from Merrick. Unfortunately, they left out some important information.

By the way, the degraded form is called Poligeenan, which is carcinogenic and banned for use in all foods...pet and human.

The part these pet food companies don't tell you (or don't realize?) is that heat, digestive enzymes, acid, and bacteria can degrade the carrageenan, thus turning it into the dangerous form, poligeenan.

Also, even the so-called "healthy" form (carrageenan) is found to cause inflammation in the gut, both in animals and humans.

This information is posted on Jackson Galaxy's website. You can read the very informative article here:

http://www.littlebigcat.com/nutrition/carrageenan-a-common-pet-food-additive/

For humans,there is no way our bodies are capable of that type of harsh reaction to degrade carrageenan into poligeenan.  Yes, our stomach acids are powerful, 1 to 3 pH powerful (that's about the same as battery acid) but it's nowhere near the right temperature required to degrade carrageenan.  The temperature to degrade carrageenan into poligeenan is about 194 F.  Our stomach and intestines tracts are about 98-100 F.

Cat's have about the same body temperature so the same can be said for them.  A cat's stomach acid is also around 2 pH, which is highly favorable for killing off bacteria (although not all bacteria - same for humans).

 

[vmurph]

They weren't referring to the temperature in the cats' bodies. They were referring to the heat that occurs during COOKING. The ingredient going into the recipe can start out as carrageenan, but become degraded after cooking.

 

[felineempathy]

I was responding to the statement you typed in bold.  But again, you need a highly aggressive and harsh reaction to turn carrageenan into poligeenan.  To do that you need acid with approximately the strength of 1 pH and 194 F.  Are you claiming that there's acid rated at 1 pH (about the same as battery acid) in our foods?

I'm repeating myself here.

 

[vmurph]

No, I'm not claiming anything. I merely posted a quote from an article written by a trusted holistic vet and advisor to the AAFCO Pet Food and Ingredient Definition Committee.

I'm not interested in debating. I'm just posting something that might be of interest to someone, that's all.

 

[felineempathy]

One thing about that blog post is she doesn't support her statement with any numbers, temperatures, pH numbers, etc.  She just straight up says, "Heat, digestive enzymes, acid, and bacteria can convert high weight carrageenans to dangerous poligeenans in the human (and presumably animal) gut."  I'm basically refuting that with numbers and the actual way to convert carrageenan in to poligeenan.

 

[zoidberg]

Id say this is pretty conclusive:
"exposure to undegraded as well as to degraded carrageenan was associated with the occurrence of intestinal ulcerations and neoplasms. This association may be attributed to contamination of undegraded carrageenan by components of low molecular weight, spontaneous metabolism of undegraded carrageenan by acid hydrolysis under conditions of normal digestion, or the interactions with intestinal bacteria. "

Reference:
"Review of harmful gastrointestinal effects of carrageenan in animal experiments."

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1242073/