In the last installment of the Allman Report, we told you what might be
in your pet's food. This installment covers the reality of what might be
in your food. Euthanized pets can wind up in the food we eat and some
say it's not just unsavory, it may be unhealthy.
At your local Schnucks store, you might not have noticed that the eggs
are different. The labels say no animal by products were used in the
chicken feed. It happened quietly. It happened fast and it happened for
a reason.
"I don't think it was ever a case that these products were unsafe, but
they may be termed, as you said, unsavory," says Victor Rikterink of
Rose Acre Farms.
Rose Acre Farms supplies the Schnucks eggs. It says it made the decision
to feed the chicken all vegetarian diets because it could no longer
guarantee what's in the feed it gets from generic feed producers.
Government regulators can't keep up with all the feed manufacturers out
there. Right now, the Food and Drug Administration allows euthanized
dogs and cats to be turned into food for animals we eventually eat, or
which create products we eventually eat. Should we be concerened?
"Not now, but science changes. It may find out this is something we
should have been watching for, but we don't believe it is right now,"
says Don Aird of the Food and Drug Administration.
The FDA admits allowing dead shelter animals into the human food chain
has its risks. For instance, researchers are just discovering that cats
can carry the feline form of mad cow disease the brain wasting bacteria
that has reaked havoc in Europe. To protect cattle herds and humans, the
FDA has already banned cattle from eating feed created in part from
rendering other cattle. A ban on cats may be next.
"I know the cats have a transmissible -- one of these TSCs -- also and
the concern would be that rendering them down, some of it could get into
the food supply and cause a problem like the mad cow and we are
concerned. We are monitoring that," Aird says.
The FDA says it will continue researching the use of other animals in
animal feed. In the mean time, pigs and poultry and even fish we all eat
are still allowed to be fed food from rendered dogs and cats, scrapings
for the floors of slaughter houses and even manure. The FDA say as long
as the processing is done right, humans consuming those animal products
are safe. However, records show the FDA hasn't even visited a Millstadt,
Ill., rendering plant since 1998. As far as the folks at Rose Acre Farms
are concerned, that's a gamble consumers shouldn't have to take.
"These are moral issues. These are political issues and our job as a
food producers is to produce the food of the type the consumer wants to
purchase," Rikterink says.
Chickens that only lay eggs are eventually turned into human food.
Usually their meat is used to make things like chicken nuggets or it's
put into soups. As far as the chickens you buy in the store, Tyson says
it does not feed its chickens anything that comes from rendering plants.
You simply need to ask your favorite chicken maker what it does.
When it comes to beef, proteins from shelter animals and manure will be
used more often to feed cattle because of the ban on feeding cow parts
to cows.
