Chicken Strips Killing Dogs

Many dogs fed chicken strips have become ill and some have died. After eating dried chicken strips, dogs have developed lethargy, vomiting, diarrhea, bloody diarrhea (melana), and increased water consumption with increased urination (polyuria/polydipsiaor PUPD). Your dog can develop symptoms within hours of eating the chicken strips, or your pet may develop symptoms gradually.

Fanconi Syndrome
Dogs that died appeared to have kidney failure or Fanconi-like syndrome. In some dogs, the symptoms developed quickly and in other dogs, symptoms developed over weeks or months. Fanconi syndrome is a type of kidney failure with glucose in the urine. In humans, Fanconi syndrome has been linked to exposure to toxins, including cadmium, lead and mercury, and to certain medications.

Nestle Purina Fails To Act
Nestle Purina makes two brands of chicken strips that have been implicated in pet poisoning and dog illness: Waggin’ Train and Canyon Creek Ranch. Nestle Purina has refused to withdraw Waggin’ Train and Canyon Creek Ranch even though the FDA has had over a thousand complaints of poisoning.

Nestle Purina and other suppliers of chicken strips claim the FDA hasn’t found what’s wrong with their products. Nestle Purina plans to continue to market dried chicken strips until the exact toxin or cause of illness is has been identified.

Toxin Tests
Among the tests that have been done on chicken jerkey treats were assays for melamine, the ingredient that killed so many in China and throughout the world. The FDA also tested for drugs, poisons, toxins, mycotoxins, heavy metals, formaldehyde, antibiotics, and maleic acid. Despite their efforts, the FDA has not identified a toxic cause of poisonings. Some are now considering whether it is not what is contained in the dried chicken jerkey,but how it is processed. For example, has irradiation caused molecular change in the dried meat that is poisoning dogs? Irradiated pet foods have poisoned cats and vets no longer recommend feeding irradiated pet food.

VeggieDents Also Implicated in Pet Poisoning
In Europe and Australia, concerns over chicken strips have been joined by concerns over non-chicken product, VeggieDents. Concerns about pet health were so high that Virbac, the maker of VeggieDents, pulled them from the Australian market. Australian VeggieDents were made in Vietnam. VeggieDents are still being sold in some countries.

What’s Safe?
Veterinarians are recommending families don’t feed dogs & cats any treats, chicken strips, dried sweet potatoes, etc, from China or any treats that are irradiated. It’s easy to recognize irradiated food because it’s marked with a symbol called a radura.

Unfortunately, it is not always easy to recognize treats made in China . Large batches of Chinese treats may be shipped to a another country and packaged in the recipient country. Then, labelled as from the country that did the packaging. For example, dried chicken strips made in China can be bulk shipped to Canada, packaged in Canada, and labelled made in Canada. Until this practice of labelling the packaging country as thugh it’s the source country is changed, it’s safer not to feed chicken strips.

Safe Treats For Pets
I recommend feeding dried liver from Canada or the US or feeding real food such as peas, blueberries, and carrot shavings as treats.

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