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Courtesy the Mawaka family.
Elizabeth Mawaka of Hartford, Conn., has sued makers and sellers of chicken jerky dog treats, which she blames for the death of two dogs, including Toby, shown above. She called on Nestle Purina PetCare Co. officials to allow U.S. inspectors to test samples from China plants.
Chinese government officials overseeing plants that make chicken jerky pet treats blamed for thousands of illnesses and deaths among American dogs have refused to allow U.S. inspectors to collect samples for independent analysis, newly released records show.
Investigators with the federal Food and Drug Administration came away empty-handed after conducting April inspections at four jerky treat manufacturing sites in Liaocheng and Jinan, China, according to the records.
The plants make pet treats sold by the St. Louis-based Nestle Purina PetCare Co., including the popular Waggin’ Train jerky brands.
Chinese officials stipulated that FDA officials could collect samples only if they agreed to specific conditions, including a requirement that the samples be tested in Chinese-run laboratories.
As a result, “no samples were collected during this inspection,” wrote Dennis L. Doupnik, an FDA investigator who visited the sites.
In addition, the reports showed that the Chinese plants conducted either no laboratory tests or only sporadic tests of the raw materials, including meat used in treats fed to many of the 78.2 million pet dogs in the U.S.
The FDA found no significant violations and issued no citations, but warned plant owners about problems that included broken supports on metal screens, a torn gasket door on a mixer and failure to file proper paperwork to list actual treat manufacturers instead of shippers or brokers in FDA records.
That means the agency appears to be no closer to solving the mystery of about 2,000 reports of illnesses or deaths in U.S. dogs that ate jerky treats made in China, lawmakers and pet owners said on Tuesday. Despite tests of hundreds of treats in the U.S. over five years, the FDA has found no significant levels of contaminants in the products.
“It’s hard to believe the FDA would send a team of inspectors over to China without first getting a guarantee that they could bring samples back,” said Rep. Dennis Kucinich, D-Ohio, who has been tracking the jerky problem. “They’re doing nothing of consequence. The FDA’s tone-deaf on this one.”
Elizabeth Mawaka, 57, a Hartford, Conn., woman who says her two Boston terriers, Max and Toby, died after eating tainted treats, called on Nestle Purina to demand that samples be released to the FDA.
“It really comes down to the company,” said Mawaka, who is suing jerky treat makers and retailers. “We can talk all we want about China, but it’s really the company.”
However, a Nestle Purina spokesman said the inspections demonstrated no problems with the firm's products and no evidence that they’ve led to illnesses in animals in the U.S.
Keith Schopp, the firm’s vice president of public relations, said that it’s common for countries to refuse to have samples tested outside of the country of origin and that the terms of the inspection were set by the U.S. and Chinese governments, not by Nestle Purina or the manufacturing site officials.
“There was no attempt by Nestle Purina or the Chinese facilities to restrict sample collection,” said Schopp said in an email to NBCNews.com.
"Nestle Purina will continue to cooperate fully with FDA to assist its investigation," added Schopp, who has consistently said the treats are safe to feed as directed.
Tamara N. Ward, an FDA spokeswoman, said in an email that the inspections helped to identify additional areas that the agency may investigate, but there is "no evidence indicating that these firms' jerky pet treats are the cause of pet illnesses in the United States."
Ward did not respond to NBC News questions about the impact of the Chinese officials' refusal to allow FDA to collect samples.
Last November, the FDA issued its third warning since 2007 about potentially dangerous chicken jerky treats after new reports of health problems in dogs surfaced, ranging from diarrhea and vomiting to kidney failure and death. In the months since then, the agency has been swamped with reports of animal illness. Last month, it expanded the caution to include duck and sweet potato jerky treats.
The FDA sent a letter to Chinese officials in March identifying five Chinese firms for inspection. Investigators were sent for several days to each of four plants: Gambol Pet Products Co. Ltd.; Shandong Honva Food Co. Ltd.; and Shandong Petswell Food Co. Ltd., all in Liaocheng, China, and Jinan Uniwell Pet Food Co. Ltd. in Jinan, China, according to reports posted this week on the agency’s animal and veterinary website. The fifth report is pending because of the need for additional information and will be posted later, said Ward, the FDA spokeswoman.
The inspections were pre-arranged and supervised by officials with China’s General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine, known as AQSIQ.
AQSIQ officials refused to allow FDA inspectors to collect samples unless they agreed to “certain sampling conditions,” including having the jerky analyzed only in a Chinese government-run laboratory, or a third-party lab in China, wrote FDA investigator Doupnik. FDA investigators would have been allowed to witness the analysis, but not to remove samples.
“I was informed that FDA would not be allowed to ship any samples outside of China for testing in an FDA laboratory due to the issue of national sovereignty among other reasons,” Doupnik added.
Before each inspection, the reports indicated that Doupnik asked AQSIQ officials if their position on the sampling had changed. When he was informed it had not, Doupnik wrote that he did not ask to collect samples during the inspections.
The heavily redacted documents, known as Establishment Inspection Reports, traced the production of jerky treats from raw meat through final packaging. In each case, plant officials said they were aware of few complaints of any kind and none about the treats causing death or illness in dogs. That's despite documented FDA reports of complaints related to each site, Doupnik noted.
At the Shandong Petswell plant, an unidentified plant representative told inspectors that “it is her perception that the firm is making a good product.”
No FDA import alerts or import refusals have been issued for the firms, Ward said. However, she added that the FDA is conducting increased surveillance of shipments of jerky treats from China to provide guidance on possible products to target for sampling and analysis.
But Kucinich said that Chinese officials' refusal to release samples to U.S. inspectors should be grounds for banning the products from import -- or for a mandatory recall.
“That would do it for that product. I would pull them all off the market,” said Kucinich. “Fine. You’re done.”
Consumers have petitioned the FDA to urge Nestle Purina and other jerky treat manufacturers to recall the products. However, FDA officials have said they can’t force a recall based solely on customer complaints.
Related stories on Vitals:
- Jerky treats from China blamed for pet deaths; owners sue
- 3 big brands may be tied to chicken jerky illness in dogs, FDA records show
- FDA data dump shows few toxins in jerky treats
- Arthur Dogswell recalls cat chicken jerky treats, FDA says
Leave a Comment:
Lets see how china reacts to nobody buying there crappy dog treats. My fear is that the chicken treats are really dog meat or something cause you know they do eat dogs. no more money from me or my dog. thats 50 bucks a week you china people wont get anymore. You no what china if we I mean americans stop buying your cheap tablets dog treats and other crap, and we stopped trading with you, and treated china like cuba then china would be broke as a joke.
Hey china you are only making good money because of us americans. maybe we will start buying from india instead of you cheap rip off people
Boycott Nestle-Purina, and all American companies who don't care about quality or enforicing safety standards. American companies are dangerous.
FlaNative, it is common sense, do not buy ANYTHING from China.
I look at the package and if it says made in China, I do not buy it. I only buy things made in the USA and I make sure that what goes into the food is also from USA. Your all going to say that the ingredients can come from China, but think about it, why would a company buy ingredients from China, pay for the shipping and then manufacture it here. Too expensive, makes no sense.
I was in Publix the other day (Publix is a grocery store in the south east for those of you who do not know what it is) and I was looking for a treat for my dogs and most of everything was from China. I was looking for the rawhide sticks that they carry(they are not made in China, Made in Paraguay, do not know that is much better but at least it is not China) all they had was the big package of 100 sticks, so I asked the employee if they had anymore of the small packages and she said that they were not carrying them anymore. I asked her if they where going to carry any products that were not made in China and she said that they can not find a good distributor. I looked at her like, really!!!! The only thing I found was from Sergeant's bully sticks, the package says Made in the USA, I bought them and then I find dental rawhide sticks that are made in Deerfield Beach, FL, so I bought them but that is it for the dog products that are made in America.
People, if you do a search for MADE IN AMERICA for dogs this is what comes up, it gives you a variety of companies that make dog treats.
http://www.toysmadeinamerica.com/dogs.html
Made in America sucks. I don't want anything made by fat, white, lazy, entitled American morons. Buy ONLY Japan-made.
It's past time for the Feds to stop allowing the Chinese to dump substandard pet foods on the American market. This should stay in effect until China and whatever other countries are exporting food and pet food to the US until they can demonstrate that their testing standards are as stringent as ours and violations are dealt with in a reasonable and consistent manner (fines, shutting down of plants until the problem is rectified, possible loss of business liscences for repeat offenders etc.)
WOW!!
That pretty much sums things up, doesn't it!
Our guys...FDA bigwigs...come strolling in to China, making demands and thinking they're going to strong arm their way in and lay down the law like they're John Wayne, or Clint Eastwood!
But then OOOOPS!! What's this?!! The Chinese respond with a big, brash "F*** Y**"!!
HMMMmmmmmm....NOW what do we do?? Maybe we could try saying "PLEASE"??
Let's face it... China KNOWS that they are the new, big bully on the playground, and there's just no way they're going to give us back our ball, so we might as well face up to it and chalk this up to just another tell of where our relationship with them is headed. There's never enough room for very long for TWO big bullies to be on the same playground. And it always begins with the posturing, like two colorful roosters fluffing out their feathers and doing their "I'm bad" dance before one another. But at some point, the dancing ends when one of them decides it's time to strike!! Yeah, yeah...I hear you..."but this is just dog food! It's no big deal". Really?? No big deal when agents of our government take a trip to China, thinking that they're going to get some respect and that the Chinese are going to bow before them and comply?...but then, in front of the whole world, the Chinese tell them to take a hike. THINK AGAIN! We are the USA!!! WE make the rules, and everyone else follows them! You doubt it? Then you tell me, why did these agents PERSONALLY make this trip, without first contacting China to establish why they were coming, and what the protocol should be so that there would not be any embarrassing screw ups, and everyone would know their place? I'll tell you why...and it wasn't because they wanted to be slapped in the face in front of all the other kids on the playground! No, it's because they fully expected that their showing up PERSONALLY would be VERY intimidating, resulting in an immediate "GAME OVER". ...OOPS!...apparently they had no "plan B" in place, because they had never expected the results that they encountered! You can't tell me that they went there EXPECTING to be shown the door.
...THINK ABOUT IT...'cause it's got me thinking.
Some of your fellow citzens are really, really slow. The new bully and we owe them money? Sounds like a recipe for a Greek tragedy...
With the administration we have now, we have lost face with the whole world. Why should they pay any attention to our third world country.
I say we just scrap the little china men from the bottom of my boot and feed that to the dogs. The little human looking things will deserve what they get for KILLING MY DOGGSSSS!!!!! """FFFFF"""" The red commies. Stick that star up "my here on a visa" neighbor. LONG LIVE AMERICA!!
don't knock off my caps msn YEAH! LONG LIVE AMERICA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
My cat died because of the last fiasco with cat food. China has no rules they are barbarians and unfortunately becoming powerful because we cater to them. They make and sell anything they want and because of their ridiculous belief that they are superior they think they don't have to be accountable. Well, make the food in the USA, it may cost more but it will be accountable and will give jobs to Americans. China needs to deal with their own people and quit exporting junk, and I mean real junk. I take a very close look at wherre the product is made and if it says Made in China I look for USA brand instead.
Well, if the FDA can't stop importing then people stop buying. Make up your own treats for your pets. It will show China that they can keep their toxin products. Besides our pets would be better for it.
These people eat dog's they don't view them as pets. How is it in the least bit logical that these company's would intrust our beloved companions to these manufacturing plants. I certainly will not buy from them until their pet food in manufactured in the US.
I make my own dog and cat treats it cost no more then this poison and in the long run after vet bills and suffering is well worth the time.
People need to read the labels on the back of any pet food they buy anything that is manufactured in any other country should not be sold in the US.
Finally why is China dictating to US inspectors- (the same people who are paid for with American tax dollars) what is to be inspected coming into the US.
Amber: Really good point you just made. If our inspectors are denied entrance into their plants then our government should deny their products entrance into our country!!
I have one solution!!!!!! Please sign this petition!!!!!!
After looking into a class action lawsuit and being told there is nothing they can do because the FDA cannot get into China to test the strips, I started a petition on Change.org asking Dogswell to stop making their treats in China. Please sign the petition.
I think we should just stop buying from those companies that have china produce their products, Pet food for one, It seems like this problem has been going on for some time now.I wonder if the higher ups in the companies are getting kick backs for turning a blind eye to these issues ? Every time I turn around I see in the news something from china is putting us at some sort of risk. I didn't see anything here about UN-SAFE toys that our children are exposed to that come out of china, I don't go to the dollar stores where most if not all of the products come from china.
Think about it.You need to get rid of 1000 tons of lead say.Mix a gram in each of 5 million toys -do the math-lead gone i think.Any contaminant can be put in all the crap we buy from our "friends" If our greatest generation knew we'd be sold out to chinese they would've killed those responsible,like their own kids
I had no idea.I can't even believe we need china for dog treats.Rory will have to do w/o any of her favorites-ching chongs
Lets be Honest Folks, Americans for the most part are greedy and lazy. They want top dollar for their time (work) but want to buy as cheaply as possible and as quick asap.
So Walmart is the logical choice cheap and get most everything in one trip. Good old greed got us into the mess we are in now from top to bottom of our society.
Hope fully the world will wake up and see that our great global economy is killing the earth trying to make everyone rich. Think Figi water shipped all over the globe each bottles carbon foot print is way bigger than any benefit the water could bring.
Well said. Anericans are entitled, spoiled, angry @ssholes. Oh, and stupid as hell. They don't blame Nestle-Purina, but instead point their racist fat fingers at China because they are not white. Gimme a break. China sucks, yes, but so does AMerica. The worst combination of all; American corporate leaders are all greedy, money-grubbing thieves.
The only thing we give our dog now is fresh apples pealed and chunked, baby carrots from the bag and frozen peas. This is vet approved. We were giving our dog Waggin Train treats until he had a spell of no motor skills and lost all of his abilities to maneuver for about five minutes. He had been eating the rawhide strips rolled up and liver in the center. We told the vet what had happened and he said do not give your pet any treats beside the ones he told us about listed above. So our dog only gets what the vet says is acceptable. No more store bought treats.
I'm seeing more and more USA products on shelves these days...even over the last year. I hope the on-shoring trend continues. Please be cognizant of what you buy and where you buy it. If there is a cost difference consider the broader picture. Also, consider the hidden costs of "buying china"...inferior steel in appliances & big ticket items, lax safety regs, poor human working conditions (e.g. FoxConn). You may save 20% on an item today, but you will be replacing it again soon (probably from China again). Quality and Quality Control are not to American standards. China is just a way to increase corporate profits and pass SOME of the savings on to you. You still get what you pay for.
Sadly, you are wrong. Quality and safety are up to American standards. It's the American company that sets the standards. If you want real quality, buy only Japanese products made in Japan by Japanese workers.
I totally agree!!
Ah what a strange development!Looks like a cover up to protect the Capitalist in the U.S buying cheap Chinese products to turn a bigger profit.All at the blessing of the U.S. Government.Business men and Politicians make strange bed fellows.BEWARE ! ! ! !
China, the FDA and the companies that make the product from raw ingredients: "We do not see any evidence of contamination, so frak off."
Pet Owners: "The evidence is in hundreds of recent deaths and thousands sickened."
Since it appears impossible to stop the entities that are responsible, the only way to be safe is to stop buying their tainted products.
Our pets are as much family as our children! Actually, I feed my two Boston Terriers and a cat also .. from my plate. My food is okay. When growing up my parents only fed our pets from "table scraps" .. and they lived long and healthy lives. Do we really need to buy food made from inferior products for our animal family members? Really? Re-thinking the whole think. We feed our pets dry food from supposedly safe providers, the people food is "special". Maybe it all ought to be our "people food" left overs, just like in the old days.
American companies are interested only in profits, not quality or safety. Boycott all American products. Buy only Japanese. Boycott all Chinese-made things, too. Buy on Japanese. That's where the quality and reliability is. NOt Western products. Western products are killing everyone.
Its all really simple. "If you will not let us bring back samples for testing, your product will no longer be allowed into the U.S. Give us a call and send travel expenses if you change your mind."
The problem is that even though an American company name is on the label the ingredients could have been purchased by that company from Who Knows Where. So I have stopped buying Chinese products for my pets.
I have a cookbook for dogs called Bone Apetit that has some good recipes but what are we supposed to do bake treats several times a week? If you make their biscuits as I did omit the chicken...give them gas. I hope the Paul Newman dog biscuits are safe because I just bought lots of those but my labs like the rawhide chewies which I hope are safe. It's very frustrating that we cannot purchase products which we are sure are safe and from the US.
When you consider that in the 1970's one of our major American baby food companies (not sure if Beechnut or Gerber) was found to provide only sugar and water (not a droop of actual juice) in their applejuice formula what won't a foreign company hesitate to do to our pets?
I have been giving my dog treats like this for around seven or eight years, as so far so good, from what I can tell. I shall stop to do some research. However, I agree with Kucinich. If the U.S. cannot get samples to test themselves in our labs, then I would find or create a way to say that's fine, but you cannot then import them to the U.S. You are done. Your choice, our choice.
This is a easy one. Let the pet food manufacturing company representitives eat some of the treat! If they won't don't let your dog eat them!!!
There is a very simple solution to this problem...if the Chinese will not cooperate with the inspections and analysis of their products, as animal owners, we simply do not buy them! Personally, I do not buy any animal treats unless they are marked made in USA. This is no guarantee, but it surely does lessen the chance that I'm feeing tainted products to my animals. Vote with your feet, people, and boycott Chinese made treats. Once there is no longer a market for them, the Chinese people will just have to eat both the dark and light chicken meat, since no one will buy their exported treats! Get the word out, and BOYCOTT the Chinese made products!!
Sounds like the same old same old someone's pocket getting padded. We can't simply boycott the "product" because there are too many uninformed people, and too many lazy people that will continue to buy these products!
The only way to reverse this calamity is to boycott the stores that continue to sell these products! Just because the padded pockets of the FDA has supposedly not found contaminated products, these stores somehow feel compelled to continue selling it? I just don't get it.....its not like this is their staple product that keeps their doors open. How hard is it to simply take one freaking product off the shelf. If I were a store owner I would proudly advertise "Made in USA" and reap the benefits of so many willing pet owners that would shun store's like Petco and flock to my store in confidence that they can buy safe product there.
What does this tell you about these stores that continue to sell this product? It tells you that a few extra bucks is worth more than the health of a our pets. And all this marketing about all these other so damn expensive foods that they sucker people in to buying such as Iams products that are supposedly so much better for our pets health that the other cheaper brands. Sounds pretty contradictory to me!
Here's a suggestion, buy the real beef jerky made here in the U.S., the same thing us people eat. Problem solved.