The FDA has posted a press release as a follow-up to the September recall of Premium Edge cat food by Diamond.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE – November 27, 2009 – On September 23, Diamond Pet Foods issued a voluntary recall for Premium Edge Finicky Adult Cat and Premium Edge Hairball cat because they have the potential to produce Thiamine Deficiency. Today’s announcement provides additional information from the company’s posted announcement of September 23 when the initial recall information was provided.
Thiamine is essential for cats. Symptoms of deficiency displayed by an affected cat can be gastrointestinal or neurological in nature. At the first stage the cat may show decreased appetite, salivation, vomiting, and weight loss. Later, neurologic signs can develop, which may include ventriflexion (bending towards the floor) of the neck, wobbly walking, circling, falling, and seizures. These ultimately may result in the death of the animal if left untreated. If your cat has consumed the recalled product and has these symptoms, please contact your veterinarian.
The affected products were distributed in Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New Jersey, Maryland, Delaware, New York, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Alabama, Tennessee, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Florida.
The affected date codes were RAF0501A22X 18lb. (BB28NOV10), RAF0501A2X 6 lb. (BB28NOV10), RAF0802B12X 18lb (BB30FEB11), RAH0501A22X 18 lb. (BB28NOV10), RAH0501A2X 6lb. (BB28NOV10, BB30NOV10, BB08DEC10)
To date, 21 cases of thiamine deficiency in cats have been reported and confirmed by Diamond. The reports have been confined to the New York and Pennsylvania areas and none have been received since October 19.
Diamond has tested the product and found the cat foods were deficient in thiamine. Samples taken by the FDA indicated that there were additional lots with insufficient levels of thiamine. No other complaints have been reported on any other product manufactured by Diamond Pet Foods.
Consumers who have purchased the affected lots are urged to return it to the place of purchase for a full refund. Consumers with questions may contact the company at 1-800-977-8797, Monday-Friday, 8:00 am to 5:00 pm Central Time.
You’ll find the release here: Diamond Pet Foods Announces Recall of Premium Edge Adult Cat and Premium Edge Hairball Cat Food
(thanks Carol)
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http://www.premiumedgepetfood.com/announcements/66/
This says 2 dates affected so it appears it has expanded from the 1 date mentioned in the FDA release of 10/20…
and there are 4 BB dates so this is also a concern…is it a typo with FDA or were there more bad dates of manufacture..
http://www.fda.gov/AnimalVeterinary/NewsEvents/CVMUpdates/ucm187218.htm
I called and spoke to a rep @ Premium Edge who said “no new recall” just that FDA issues a press release after their investigation—I asked her why two production dates if the problem was isolated to a 12 minute production error (Susan Thixton was told that) and she had no response..I asked if it was expanded to include more states and she said no states were posted on their site..Now off to do some digging..something does not seem right with this!
I could have sworn initial reports said they only had reports of affected cats in Rochester and now this says Pennsylvania too? All this does is show me that Diamond did everything they could to minimize this food problem and not get word out to as many people as they could. Now here we are two months later and they are now making a press release about it? I just hope no one’s cat died as a result of not knowing about this earlier. And I have to ask, is this the sign of a company that cares about our pets? I would say no.
They always come up with some excuse on why they didnt do something. If one of their pets got sick because of them not being told about a known pet food problem, I find it hard to believe they would be very understanding but yet they expect other people to be.
Seems like Diamond keeps having some problem or another going back to 1995 and still. If not dogfood, then catfood, but it always goes back to something. I got lucky in the earlier incident with mold, I had just quit feeding their dogfood when it just vanished from the shelves. I didn’t know what happened until the whole recall exploded.
But, these days buying a bag of petfood is like playing the lotto, you don’t know if you will win or your pet will get sick or die.