Lawsuit Claims Thousands Of Dogs Became Ill Or Died After Eating Purina’s Beneful Kibble

[Panich52]

Lawsuit Claims Thousands Of Dogs Became Ill Or Died After Eating Purina’s Beneful Kibble
by Ashlee Kieler

A recently filed lawsuit claims that instead of containing nutrient-rich, high-quality ingredients, Nestle Purina PetCare Company’s most popular brand of dog food includes toxins that have led to serious illness or death for thousands of dogs.

The potential class action (PDF https://consumermediallc.files.wordpress.com/2015/02/purina.pdf ), filed in a federal court in California earlier this month, claims that Purina’s Beneful brand of dry dog food contains substances that are known to be toxic to animals and can lead to internal bleeding and other serious health issues for pets.

The California man who filed the lawsuit against Purina alleges that less than a month after beginning to exclusively feed his dogs Beneful dry kibble, all three became ill and his 8-year-old English Bulldog eventually died.

“Post-mortem veterinary examination revealed signs of internal bleeding in the dog’s stomach and lesions on his liver,” the lawsuit states. “[The man] is currently awaiting the results of post-mortem toxicology testing on Dozer.”
The man’s two remaining dogs are still ill and undergoing medical testing.

A lawyer for the plaintiff tells NBC News that because of home renovations the dogs were kept in separate areas, meaning the only constant condition was the Beneful food they consumed.

The lawsuit alleges that the illnesses experienced by thousands of dogs across the country were a result of toxins in Beneful such as, but not limited to Propylene glycol and Mycotoxins.

Propylene glycol, the lawsuit states, is an automotive antifreeze component that is a known animal toxin. However, the substance is also an FDA-approved food additive for humans.

As for Mycotoxins, the lawsuit states they are a group of toxins produced by fungus that occurs in grains.

Purina-produced dog food named in the lawsuit includes Purina Beneful Healthy Weight, Purina Beneful Original, Purina Beneful Incredibites, Purina Beneful Healthy Growth For Puppies, Purina Beneful Healthy Smile, Purina Beneful Healthy Fiesta, Purina Beneful Healthy Radiance, and Purina Beneful Playful Life.

Keith Schoop, an executive with Purina PetCare, tells the St. Louis Business Journal that the lawsuit is “without merit” and that the company plans to vigorously defend itself.

“Like other pet foods, Beneful is occasionally the subject of social media-driven misinformation,” Purina’s rep says. “The incredible power of the Internet is sometimes used to spread false information. On-line postings often contain false, unsupported and misleading allegations that cause undue concern and confusion for Beneful consumers.”

Still, the California man claims that his story is similar to more than 3,000 complaints filed by consumers over the past four years.

According to the lawsuit, consumers reported their pets displayed symptoms such as stomach and related internal bleeding, liver malfunction or failure, vomiting, diarrhea, dehydration, weight loss, seizures, bloating and kidney failure shortly after eating Beneful.

“After opening a new bag of Playful Life by Beneful my dog was horribly sick,” a complaint cited in the California lawsuit states. “He was vomiting, diarrhea, lethargic, wheezing and couldn’t walk or eat. We rushed him to the vet where he was put on steroids, IV to re-hydrate and antibiotics. He almost died. He was there for four days…This past Monday we started him back on Beneful (the same bag). He was worse than before in just hours. We got him to the hospital and the vet got him on an IV and flushed his system. He was sure it was this Lot of food.”

Other consumer complaints cited in the lawsuit detail the thousands of dollars pet owners have spent to determine what made their dogs sick.

“My 1 1/2 year old dog has been suffering with vomiting, diarrhea, lethargic and no desire to eat for the last three weeks,” a complaint states. “We’ve been back and forth to the vet and vet hospital many times. I’ve spent over $6,000 on overnight stays and exploratory surgery…My dog had been home for four days and all he was eating was chicken cheerios, yogurt and pumpkin. Last night he ate Beneful and today we are back to square one…This food should not be on the market!!”

The class action suit seeks unspecified damages and restitution for dog owners who bought the dog food and “incurred any out-of-pocket costs due to illness, injury or death of their dog resulting from the ingestion of Beneful.”


Lawsuit Claims Purina’s Beneful Is Poisoning, Killing Dogs [NBC News] http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/lawsuit-claims-purinas-beneful-poisoning-killing-dogs-n312176
Lawsuit alleges Purina’s Beneful can harm, kill dogs [St. Louis Business Journal] http://www.bizjournals.com/stlouis/news/2015/02/24/lawsuit-alleges-purina-s-beneful-can-harm-kill.html?page=all

Consumerist
http://consumerist.com/2015/02/25/lawsuit-claims-thousands-of-dogs-became-ill-or-died-after-eating-purinas-beneful-kibble/
•

[Erich Bloodaxe BSN]

1. Reccing for exposure.

Our companion animals are totally dependent upon us, like children. There can be no worse feeling than when you find out you've been feeding toxins to those you love.

[Thinkingabout]

2. I guess I am surprised to know he saw a difference in his dogs physical condition

Before taking action. Anytime I give my dog different food or meds I am watching them carefully to see of she vomits or shows other signs of distress. Surely I would not allow this to occur over three weeks without a vets visit.

[leftofcool]

3. Never feed your dogs anything by Purina.

[TwilightGardener]

6. Silliness. My dogs eat Purina, my cats eat Purina.

Somehow they are fine.

[leftofcool]

15. I just don't like the ingredients

meat by products, made in china etc...

[TwilightGardener]

18. Whatever's in Purina One True Instinct/Turkey and Venison, it's about

the only dog food that the female of my two wiener dogs will eat. I've never had a problem feeding any of my pups, cats or kittens Purina. My old tomcat has had health problems since I adopted him 12 years ago--inflammatory bowel and bladder prob's--but despite prescription diets from the vet and a number of other diet plans and expensive "novel protein" foods, the problems persist, so he's either on prednisone or he just lives with the bloody poops. I've given up and assume at this point it's not dietary, maybe just an autoimmune issue.

[840high]

19. My cats always had

diarrhea after Purina.

[hollysmom]

14. next dog won't but this one eats only Purina one

Now Eukanuba and almost killed my prior dog until I found out the only commercial food she could eat was science diet - it is the dry dog foods, my dogs can eat any moist food and their favorites are left overs, heh but the moist food I feed the purina dog are fresh pet, she drools when I take it out of the shopping bag, I tried to switch her off purina several times, but she is 15 and going strong, so I guess hers is less putrefied.

[GreatGazoo]

28. Beneful is slammed regularly by objective reviews of dog food

The ads are very misleading sicne the food is loaded with known allergens, grain, soy, sugar, food dyes, synthetic vitamin K. Almost no meat at all:

Inadequate meat content, byproducts, low quality ingredients throughout, fat of unidentifiable origin, artificial color, sugar
...
There is a named meat product (beef) 7th on the ingredient list. This is not a meat meal, but instead is inclusive of water content (about 80%). Once this is removed, as it must be to create a dehydrated product, the ingredient will weigh around 20% of its wet weight. As ingredients are listed in order of weight, it is thus unlikely that this ingredient is truely amongst the most prolific in the food and would be more accurately placed further down the ingredient list. At wet weight only the 7th ingredient in the the food, it is likely that the true amount of this ingredient is significantly lower


Soy flour boosts the protein content of the food. Soy is a product we prefer not to see used in dog foods, especially this high on the ingredient list. Soy is a very common cause of food allergy problems, and although boosting the (otherwise minimal) protein content of this food, it is very low quality protein compared to that sourced from meat. Brewers rice which is a low quality byproduct. There is a small amount of fruit and vegetable matter in the food.


We note the presence of synthetic vitamin K - a substance alleged by some to be linked to liver problems and which is progressively being removed from better quality products. There is no excuse for adding artificial colorings or sugar to dog food products.

http://www.dogfoodanalysis.com/dog_food_reviews/showproduct.php?product=1871&cat=all

[Smarmie Doofus]

4. Fed McGoo (Yorkie) that *ONCE*.

If memory serves: he puked.

Granted: he's known to be sensitive.

I couldn't get the "good stuff".

I chucked the rest of the bag.

[olddots]

5. I used to feed that poison to our dogs

it comes in a resealable bag and I had no clue how bad the crap is untill a friend of ours who worked for the parent company told us to stop or our dogs would be really unhealthy .

This country sells convenience instead of truth , remember leaded gass ?

[Sunlei]

7. seems like within the past decade food quality for pets and humans have both degraded.

This group has been lab testing pet foods. results are grim.

[TexasProgresive]

8. There is a big difference between Ethylene Glycol and Propylene Glycol

Ethylene Glycol is what has been standard in auto antifreeze for years and is extremely toxic to dogs and especially cats. A couple of licks and they are on the road to massive organ failure. On the other hand Propylene Glycol is not particularly toxic except in extremely large amounts. It is the standard treatment for pregnant and lactating ruminants (cows, sheep, goats) that are suffering from ketosis (a condition characterized by raised levels of ketone bodies in the body, associated with abnormal fat metabolism and diabetes mellitus.) large amounts are administered.

If there was Ethylene Glycol in the dog food the dogs eating it would be dead in days if not hours- all of them not just a few. There may be something wrong with Beneful Healthy Weight but I don't think it is Propylene Glycol. Now Mycotoxins are a whole 'nother ball game.

Not suggesting it is a good thing but Propylene Glycol is in a lot of the foods we eat, soft cookies for one:

http://www.walmart.com/ip/Quaker-Soft-Baked-Raisins-Oatmeal-Cookies-1.48-oz-6-count/22098467?u1=i6pld2aml000ylk70009i&oid=365179.1&wmlspartner=je6NUbpObpQ&sourceid=29570914762569888503&affillinktype=10&veh=aff
Quaker Soft Baked Raisins Oatmeal Cookies
Ingredients:

Whole Grain Oat Flour, Enriched Flour (Bleached And Unbleached Wheat Flour, Niacin, Reduced Iron, Thiamin Mononitrate, Riboflavin, Folic Acid), Raisins, Whole Grain Rolled Oats, Sugar, Whole Wheat Flour, Palm And High Oleic Canola Oil (With Tbhq [Preservative]), Fructose, Invert Sugar Syrup, Mid-Oleic Sunflower Oil, Raisin Paste, Inulin, Granola (Whole Grain Rolled Oats, Sugar, Soybean Oil, Honey, Molasses), Dried Eggs, Modified Corn Starch, Corn Syrup, Polydextrose, Leavening Agents (Sodium Bicarbonate, Ammonium Bicarbonate), Oat Fiber, Propylene Glycol Mono- And Diesters of Fat And Fatty Acids, Mono- And Diglycerides, Soy Lecithin, BHT (to Preserve Freshness), Citric Acid (to Preserve Freshness), Wheat Gluten, Molasses, Calcium Phosphate, Salt, Natural Flavor, Cinnamon, Allspice, Corn Starch, Enzymes. Contains Wheat, Soy, Milk And Egg Ingredients. May Contain Traces of Peanuts And Tree Nuts.

[AtheistCrusader]

12. Exactly. Propylene Glycol CAN be used as an antifreeze, it is not standard.

It shows up as environmentally friendly antifreeze, because you'd have to guzzle it to kill anyone. But it's less effective.

My lab's health went to shit and he died shortly after switching FROM the healthy weight blend, to Purina regular, but he was almost 14 and that is not abnormally young for a lab to di. Big breed, short life, same lifespan as his mom. I had a twinge of anger when I first read this, and there might be something to the mycotoxins, but I don't blame Purina for my dog's death.

[blkmusclmachine]

9. ,

,

[SheilaT]

10. How awful.

Most of us intend to give our pets decent food, whether we buy an expensive or a cheap brand.

Several years back when there was that scandal with the dog food that was made in China that was killing the dogs, I recall a friend of mine telling me that she'd bought some of it for her dog, opened it and thought it smelled nasty, but gave him some anyway. He got sick, she threw out the food and went back to what she'd been feeding him before.

[cui bono]

11. This and all those other pet food scares is why I never feed my pets those major brand foods.

The money saved in vet visits more than pays for the slightly more expensive food. Plus, my pets are my babies, they deserve better than that.

[leftofcool]

16. I agree.

[Maynar]

13. We feed our cats Natural Balance dry food

the one endorsed by Dick Van Patten. No adverse effects so far, been feeding it for years.

For canned food, we feed Wellness but I note the charts above indicate problems with Welless dry only.

Even though we don't feed can food daily, perhaps we should look for another brand. Suggestions welcomed.

The Natural Balance seems to keep them healthy. I recommend it.

[BrotherIvan]

25. From what I understand Natural Balance is a very good company

When there was the melamine scare, even though their food did not test positive, they voluntarily pulled the food from the shelves and reformulated it. To me that says they care about pets over profits. They also make the diet for many zoos, so they have very high standards.

We can only use some of the Limited Ingredient Diet foods for our cats because one is extemely allergic to poultry. I don't love all of their ingredients, but for a high quality food they are a good value. We have to feed a mix of raw and rabbit wet food by Nature's Instinct to avoid the allergies. Very expensive but much much cheaper than all the vet bills.

[rhett o rick]

17. There are harmful pet foods about so pay attention to ingredients. There is lots of info

available on the internets about what is good and what is not.

[LiberalAndProud]

20. I read the ingredients on the bag.

When the first word is "Corn," the bag goes back on the shelf. Beneful is affordable. That's the only thing it ever had going for it, filling the puppies' tummies-wise.

[Drahthaardogs]

21. Beneful is shit food.

Read the label. I would feel guilty feeding barn mice that crap.

[Revanchist]

22. I recommend this site

when picking a dog food

http://www.dogfoodadvisor.com/

Here's there review for beneful

http://www.dogfoodadvisor.com/dog-food-reviews/beneful-dog-food-dry/

[Major Nikon]

27. +1

This is the dog food I've been using for many years:

http://www.dogfoodadvisor.com/dog-food-reviews/orijen-dog-food-adult/

[LWolf]

23. I like these sources of info:

http://www.dogfoodadvisor.com/dog-food-reviews/beneful-dog-food-dry/

http://www.dogfoodanalysis.com/dog_food_reviews/showproduct.php?product=69&cat=all

[bearssoapbox]

24. We've been feeding our cats Purina for 25 or 30 years.

Don't really remember when, but it was a good middle of road and price was right to feed the strays and rescues that we had over the years. Sometimes 20-50+ at a time before we could find homes for them.

Never had any problems.

Snuggles will be 20 yrs. old this spring and Purina is all she's had. Dry and wet. She eats mainly canned Friskies but she's on a Kitten Chow kick lately so she shares with the babies. She gums the hell out of it and also likes the Chow mixed with certain of the canned foods.



We've had one other cat lived to 20+ and I think the average of the cats that we've kept is about 14-16 yrs.

I hope they find out one way or the other about the dog food.

[yourpicturehere]

26. Heard about this years ago...

I have a dog show friend (oh noes!) that has Japanese Chin and Tibetan Spaniels. She used to keep a bag of Beneful to give her dogs as snacks. She would give them a small amount when they were running around the house and she said that EVERY TIME, it gave the dogs dysentery. She called Purina and they basically told her they didn't care. This was ten years ago.

That being said, just because a dog scarfs up what you feed him/her, DOESN'T MEAN IT'S GOOD FOOD. In 2009, we were devastated by an ice storm...no electricity for 17 days. Most of the places that we buy anything were closed, too. The only food we could get was Purina One. The dogs ate like they were starving and I really do believe they were (Yes, I am paranoid.). They ate and ate and ate. When we got back to the "good" food, they would eat and say "No, more, thank you, I am full." Food for thought or paranoia...you decide.

While we are at it, getting "good" food is great, but leftovers and meat are good for dogs, too. We feed a good food, but the dogs also get vegetables and raw organ meat. And leftovers. We put leftovers and veggies in a food processor and but the "gravy" on their food. They love it and they are healthy as horses.

While we are at it, I am glad that you all have found a site to analyze the ingredients in dog food. That is how I arrived at a decision on what to feed. Beware, however, of the claim as meat as a first ingredient. IF it is the whole chicken or fish or lamb or whatever, it STILL has the water in it, which means that WATER is counted in the weight of the ingredient. Meat meal is better, (NOT byproduct meal, which is floor sweepings and beaks and hooves) because it is meat w/o the water.

If you notice ANYTHING wrong with your pets, try switching the food they eat, sometimes it works wonders. We had been feeding the same food for a while, when suddenly the dogs started scratching like they were covered in fleas and they weren't. We switched the food and they quit scratching in THREE days!

[GreatGazoo]

29. My neighbor showed me what he was feeding his dog and how much the dog loved it

I was visiting and noticed that the dog's bowl was full. "Has your dog lost his appetite?" (because that is a sign of illness). "No, he loves what I feed him..."

He loved his dog and was really trying to show that love through food. He bought all the treats -- Puperoni, the processed sticks, etc and he would fill the bowl to the rim with dry kibble then stick the Puperoni and "treats" into it. The dog ate all the treats and left the kibble. As gently as I could, I told him that was like a human eating 3 pounds of beef jerky every day. The stuff is loaded with pancreas killing chemicals that make it shelf stable. Imagine how many chemicals it takes to keep meat, especially the lipids, from spoiling for 12 months at room temperature. Add to that ingredients like cheese, garlic, and onions...unreal.

I combination with the man's wife, we got him to back off the treats. I asked months later how the dog was doing "Fine, we feed him mostly Beneful now." Uh oh. I wasn't sure what to say. Beneful is absolute crap. I had recommended grain free foods, and since they had the money, kibble that is $50 for 30 pounds. Ultimately it was their dog and I was coming off as hyper-critical and impossible.

Sad to say, the sweet dog was euthanized in October due to complication from pancreatic cancer. I blame the years of "treats" only eating for that but those damned Beneful ads make it look like health food so finding healthy dog food is like a shell game for many.

I recommend this site and its ranking:

http://www.dogfoodanalysis.com/dog_food_reviews/showcat.php/cat/8