http://www.doggybling.com/newsarticle.php?id=1070

BENEFUL DOG FOOD ALERT!!! We have received multiple notices of dogs dying after eating Beneful...
January 29th, 2007
Author: Stephanie Creekmore
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This was a response to the first email that was in our forum...
I didn't personally have a similar experience to yours, but a close friend did. When we started getting into the details, we found out that there were many cases of dog food (out of date) and other similar issues at Wal Mart. When the issue was brought up to the manager at the Wal Mart and my friend demanded that the food be removed from shelves, an employee said that the food was removed, but sent to another store. I would recommend trying to find an alternative to Wal Mart. I have and it has opened up a whole new world for me. They should be forced to remove the sign outside that says "always", because if you can shop around and can add, it is very misleasing. The sign should have to say "sometimes". Kelli
I ran out of my regular dog food Friday and got a bag of Beneful from my daughter that she had bought over Christmas when she was here visiting. It had not been opened. I fed to my dogs - one of my dogs started getting very listful and breathing rapidly Saturday night. I watched him and tried to make him comfortable. He was prone to airborne allergies so I assumed he was having one of his episodes. Saturday morning his gums whitened and he was feeling really bad. My vet was not available at that time. I went to the store and came back to find him dead. That quick! I came to work today and find that one of my coworkers lost his dog Friday after feeding him Beneful last week that he had bought around Christmas. This is seriously alarming and I will be pursueing this with the manufacturer. No coupons can replace our family member. I would like to see if there is a website where this may be documented. Jan
Other emails received- Stephanie-Ric spoke to Jan who submitted the notice above and was told that Beneful said they had no previous reports on this issue, which is contrary to multiple emails and calls we have received, most who cited direct contact and an offer of coupons from Beneful. We've even had posts to the forum, which was brand new and had only 5 members at the time. Jan's experience with an agent named Terri was better than what we heard from other people. Terri asked Jan to send samples of the dog food and they would analyze it. Terri also offered to pay for an autopsy of Jan's dog, but it was too late since the dog had already been buried. Ric asked Jan where the food was purchased, since the other reports all listed Wal Mart and yes, it was Wal Mart. For those of you who remember, the Diamond food problem from last year was also a problem with dog food. (We mistakenly listed Wal Mart as where the Diamond fiasco originated. Thanks to Kristen for the correction) From our experience, Purina is a responsible company, so it is not hard to figure out where a lot of these issues originate. We will be contacting Beneful today to hear how they are responding to this issue and will report it back here.

Contact with Beneful--Ric spoke with Lisa Culp from Beneful, who was unable to give an official response, but did seem concerned with the problem. She will send the information to corporate, who will give an official response. Lisa said she would contact us with any news, as soon as she has it. Any correspondence will be reported in our news section.
We are working on inserting a "Health Alert Ticker" on DoggyBling.com where these types of alerts can be found. As of now, I don't know of any site where notices of this type are available. Because of this, our alert is being put on the fast track. We take issues like this very seriously and will hold companies accountable for how they handle situations of this kind. Lets hope that Purina puts what is right above the bottom line.

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~ Jessica

http://www.snopes.com/critters/crusader/beneful.asp



Purina Beneful Update

In recent days, Purina learned about the unfortunate deaths of two dogs in the Huntsville, Texas, area. Concerns were raised about the possible link between consumption of Purina's Beneful dry dog food and the deaths of the two dogs. Purina takes these matters seriously, and initiated a thorough investigation. Purina's quality testing, including testing at independent laboratories, confirm the safety and efficacy of our products and confirm that the two dogs' unfortunate deaths were unrelated to our product.

Importantly, one of the Huntsville, Texas, consumers also requested product testing through her veterinarian. The veterinarian submitted a sample of product to the Texas Veterinary Medical Diagnostic Laboratory for aflatoxin analysis. We received confirmation from the consumer's veterinarian late Monday, Feb. 5, that the results for aflatoxin were negative.

Additionally, we have conducted physical inspections and analytical testing, all of which confirm that our Beneful dry dog food products are safe, and meet all quality assurance specifications. Purina initiated the testing, which was conducted by an independent third party analytical laboratory, as part of its investigation related to the two Huntsville consumer contacts. As soon as we could contact the consumers to verify product code and packaging information, we secured finished product from our factories with the same production run and date code as the products in question and submitted the samples for testing. We received test results for the samples late Monday, Feb. 5, and the results confirmed the safety and quality of the products made at our factories. More specifically, the samples showed no presence of aflatoxin.

Because the quality and safety of our products and the trust of our consumers are top priorities, Purina took additional steps, including visiting the store in Huntsville, Texas, to confirm the quality of product at retail. We obtained additional samples for any available product matching date codes and production runs related to these consumer contacts. We then submitted samples of the product for analytical testing, which also showed no presence of aflatoxin.

We at Purina are saddened to hear of the loss of these consumers' pets and appreciate the opportunity to investigate and demonstrate how seriously we take matters of this kind. We stand firmly behind the high quality of our products and reassure consumers that they can continue to feed Purina products with total confidence.
We await more specific information about what might have been the causes of death in the reported cases.

Last updated: 7 February 2007

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~ Jessica