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  • 2007-02-06 (xsd:date)
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  • Beneful Dog Food (no)
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  • In January 2007, Huntsville, Texas, resident Robert Barley switched the diet for Pearl, his 5-year-old German Shepherd/Labrador mix, and started feeding her Beneful brand dog food. Soon afterwards the seemingly healthy dog died. Around the same time another resident of Huntsville, Janet Rambeck, also began feeding Sooner, her 7-year-old Dachshund, from a bag of Beneful she had purchased at WalMart the previous month. A few days later her dog was dead, too. Those two incidents were a few of dozens of similar cases reported by dog owners to the canine product web site DoggyBling.com, each involving Beneful brand dog food purchased at WalMart. Most or all of the afflicted dogs displayed common symptoms, including white gums, glazed eyes, trouble standing erect, sluggishness, lethargy, and loss of appetite. Does this pattern indicate a manufacturing problem (on the part of Purina) or a handling/storage issue (on the part of WalMart) that might have introduced some form of toxin (such as aflatoxin) into bags of Beneful, or could the stricken dogs have become ill through other causes (with the Beneful connection being purely coincidental)? On 6 February 2007 Beneful's manufacturer, Nestle/Purina, sent us a response indicating they had investigated the Hunstville deaths and analyzed samples of the product involved, and that the results confirmed the safety and quality of the products made at our factories and the samples showed no presence of aflatoxin: Complaints about pet deaths due to Beneful saw a resurgence in January 2013, such as the following example: In response to rumors in 2013, Nestle/Purina sent us the following statement: A class action lawsuit against Nestle/Purina's Beneful brand was initiated on 5 February 2015. A Twitter account associated with the Beneful brand replied to a number of worried pet owners and denied the existence of any pet health issues related to the product: On 25 February 2015, Nestle/Purina forwarded a statement to us regarding the lawsuit filed that month. The brand reiterated their position on Beneful's safety and described the suit as baseless: On 17 November 2016, the case was dismissed after a judge ruled that it was impossible to prove that Beneful had been responsible for the dogs' deaths: Purina released a statement on their web site in response to the ruling: (en)
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