A major recall of pet food in North America has expanded to two more companies and now includes dry food for the first time, US federal health authorities and the companies said.
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) said late on Friday it notified Hill's Pet Nutrition that tests had detected byproducts of a suspect chemical in the wheat gluten it used to make Prescription Diet m/d Feline dry food.
The FDA concluded earlier on Friday that melamine, a chemical used in fertilizers in Asia and forbidden in pet food, had been found in some wheat gluten used by a Canadian company at the center of the recall two weeks ago.
Ontario-based Menu Foods makes pet food sold under several popular labels. The FDA and Menu said the suspect wheat gluten came from a Chinese supplier, which was not identified.
Menu recalled certain batches of wet pet food last month after the products were blamed for the deaths of at least 14 animals -- mostly cats.
The FDA found that wheat gluten from the same company that supplied Menu Foods was used to make the Hill's product.
Hill's, based in Topeka, Kansas, has voluntarily recalled the product, which is sold by veterinarians.
Nestle Purina PetCare Co announced in a separate statement it was voluntarily recalling all sizes and varieties of its ALPO Prime Cuts in Gravy wet dog food with specific date codes. The Missouri-based firm said it learned on Friday that "some quantity" of wheat gluten from the same supply company linked to Menu and Hill's was used on a limited basis at one of its facilities.
Meanwhile, experts said a greater sensitivity of cats to a chemical found in plastics and pesticides could explain why they have died in larger numbers than have dogs after eating contaminated pet food, experts said.
The small number of confirmed reports of pet deaths bolstered by a far larger number of unconfirmed anecdotal reports suggests cats were more susceptible to poisoning by the chemical melamine that tainted the now recalled pet food, officials with the FDA and American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA) said on Saturday.
``I am concerned we have a situation where we have a sensitive species and it is the cat,'' said Steven Hansen, a veterinary toxicologist and director of the ASPCA's Animal Poison Control center in Urbana, Illinois.
Experts have not been able to explain why the chemical would have caused the kidney failure seen so far in the confirmed pet deaths, all but one in cats.
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