Nestle's Purina Pulls Some Pet Food as Recall Widens (Update1)
By Courtney Dentch
March 31 (Bloomberg) -- Nestle SA's Purina Pet Care Co. became the third pet-food manufacturer to pull some of its products yesterday after learning it had received contaminated ingredients tied to a recall that has killed at least 16 animals.
Wheat gluten tainted with melamine, a substance used to make plastic kitchen utensils and fertilizer, was sold to Purina's Crete, Nebraska, plant, the St. Louis-based company said in a statement. The wheat gluten was provided by the same company that supplied Menu Foods Ltd., which recalled 60 million cans of cat and dog food earlier this month.
Purina pulled 13.2-ounce and 22-ounce cans of its Alpo Prime Cuts and Gravy wet dog food made at plant 1159 and bearing date codes from 7037 to 7053, the statement said. The company's 5.3- ounce Mighty Dog pouch products were removed from stores as part of the Menu Foods recall on March 16.
Calls from Bloomberg News to Purina weren't returned.
Yesterday, Colgate-Palmolive Co. unit Hill's Pet Nutrition, the maker of Science Diet pet foods, recalled its Prescription Diet m/d Feline dry food because it may contain gluten from the Menu Foods supplier.
8,000 Complaints
Menu Foods recalled food sold under brands such as Procter & Gamble Co.'s Iams and retailers' own labels. Iams dry food isn't made by Menu Foods and doesn't contain wheat gluten, Cincinnati- based Procter & Gamble said.
Melamine is used as a fertilizer in Asia and is a durable plastic used to make plates and spoons. Normal inspections of pet food wouldn't have detected the substance.
Officials traced the wheat gluten to China and have begun inspecting imports. The supplier of the wheat gluten wasn't identified.
New York state officials last week identified the rat poison aminopterin in tests of the pet food, although FDA investigators found no trace of the chemical.
The FDA has received more than 8,000 complaints from pet owners, although the official number of cat and dog deaths tied to the recall is 16. PetConnection.com, a Web site that is tracking the recall, has received reports from owners of 2,600 pet deaths from food-related kidney failure.
