AVOID FOOD THAT WILL KILL YOUR PETS!

FIND OUT HOW TO PROTECT YOUR PETS!

READ ANN MARTIN'S BOOKS!!

I would like to present a book review done by Dr. Alan Miller, ND on the book “Food Pets Die For” by Ann N. Martin.

Food Pets Die For: Shocking Facts About Pet Food

While living in Canada, Ms. Martin's two dogs became ill after eating a dry commercial dog food. She had the food analyzed by two independent labs, as well as a Ministry of Agriculture lab. The independent labs determined there was a toxic level of zinc in the dog food. After nine months of waiting for the government lab to finish its testing, the results indicated there were no toxic mineral levels. She took the pet food manufacturer to court to recover the costs of her veterinary bills and the testing, and subsequently lost the case. This began her seven-year investigation of the pet food industry.

Ms. Martin claims her investigation uncovered shocking, unknown practices of the pet food industry, including the use of diseased livestock, road kill, and euthanized pets in pet food. These are very strong allegations; however, the author says many communities contract with companies to dispose of road kill and euthanized pets. Pet owners assume their animal will be incinerated/cremated, but sometimes the contract companies sell the animals to a rendering plant, which sends the rendered material on to a pet food manufacturing plant. This is an aesthetic issue, as well as a safety issue, according to the author. Sodium pentobarbital, used widely in euthanasia, is not degraded during rendering, leaving drug residue in the meat. Ms. Martin also suggests levels of other drugs in pet foods, including antibiotics and hormones, as well as molds and fungi, may be high enough to cause harm to pets.

The parts of beef, sheep, fish, and other animals commonly used in pet food are, according to the author, often "unfit for human consumption," including spinal cords, cartilage, bone, lungs, brains, hooves, hair, intestines, fish heads and viscera.

Of the states in the U.S. which responded when contacted by the author, none had laws on the books specifically prohibiting the use of companion pets in pet food. These findings led her to investigate who regulates this industry and she found, although there are government agencies in the U.S. and Canada which govern how pet food is labeled, there is no governmental body which oversees and enforces exactly what is allowed to be used in pet foods.

The bottom line: Ms. Martin suggests pet owners not buy into the pet food industry's claims that pets can receive 100 percent of their necessary nutritional needs by ingesting pre-packaged commercial food. She advocates eschewing commercial foods and opting for a wholesome homemade diet which incorporates the protein, carbohydrates, and fats pets need. She provides recipes and other helpful hints for maintaining optimally healthy pets, and lists sources of necessary vitamins and minerals.

Ann Martin's book, Foods Pets Die For, provides information rarely seen anywhere else. It is a shocking, sometimes disgusting look into the pet food industry, and should open the reader's eyes regarding the sources of the "nutrition" most Americans trust as their pets' sole food source.

AND....FOR HER NEW BOOK:

Foreword by Shawn Messonier, DVM
Ann Martin has been investigating the multi-billion-dollar, commercial pet
food industry since 1990, and is internationally recognized as an
authority on the dangers of commercial pet foods.
In this new and updated edition of Food Pets Die For, first published by
NewSage Press in 1997, Martin once again goes behind the scenes of the
commercial pet food industry. She uncovers the unsavory ingredients that
can legally be used by commercial pet food companies, including euthanized
cats and dogs, diseased and contaminated meat, moldy grains, and rancid
fat. Ann Martin also documents the ongoing animal experimentation funded
by many major pet food companies in the name of nutritious pet food.

Ann Martin arms consumers with crucial information on how to read labels
on pet food, and discern for themselves whether or not they want to feed
their pets commercial food. Martin offers healthy alternatives for feeding
animal companions with nutritious and easy-to-prepare recipes. For people
who don't have the time to cook, Martin provides information on several
pet food companies that produce healthy, human-grade pet food. Ann Martin
builds a strong case for why our pets will live longer, healthier lives
without commercial pet food.

Ann Martin's investigative writing on commercial pet food has garnered
special recognition from Project Censored, sponsored by Sonoma State
University's School of Journalism, as one of the most important yet
underreported news stories. Since then, this classic has become a
grassroots bestseller among health-minded pet owners. Martin's second
book, Protect Your Pet: More Shocking Facts, also addresses problems of
commercial pet food as well as other pet-related health concerns such as
over-vaccination, the raw meat diet, Rimadyl, bloat, and more.

Ann Martin is a pet columnist for Better Nutrition magazine. She is also
a frequent guest on U.S. and Canadian radio and television shows to
present her views on the commercial pet food industry.

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PROTECT YOUR PET!!

ANOTHER EARTH SHAKING BOOK BY ANN MARTIN!

Some major veterinary colleges such as Colorado State University, along with a growing number of veterinarians in private practice, now question if the risks of yearly vaccinations might outweigh the risks of animals contracting some of these diseases. Titer testing, described below, gives a pet owner a good indication how often an animal companion should be vaccinated. Even the American Animal Hospital Association (AAHA) cautions against excessive vaccinations. In August 1999, the AAHA released its opinion paper regarding vaccinations. The AAHA President, Michael Paul, DVM, wrote, "The intent of the opinion paper is to encourage veterinarians to consider vaccination procedures as medical decisions and not automatic actions prompted by a calendar."(4)

Although some veterinary colleges and veterinarians are stating publicly that pets are immune to these diseases for one, two, three years, and even longer after the initial vaccinations, it is still common practice in the United States and Canada for veterinarians to recommend yearly vaccinations. The necessity of frequent vaccinations is now being called into question.

Jean Dodds, DVM, a veterinarian in private practice in Santa Monica, California and one of the foremost experts in pet vaccinations, believes that vaccinations with single or combination modified live virus are increasingly recognized contributors to immune-mediated blood diseases, bone marrow failure, and organ dysfunction. Dr. Dodds also lists leukemia, thyroid disease, Addison’s disease, diabetes and lymphoma as diseases that can be triggered by vaccines. "Combining viral antigens, especially those of modified live virus (MLV) type, which multiply in the host, elicits a stronger antigenic challenge to the animal," explains Dr. Dodds in an article on the immune system. "This is often viewed as desirable because a more potent immunogen presumably mounts a more effective and sustained immune response. However, it can also overwhelm the immuno compromised or even a healthy host that is continually bombarded with other environmental stimuli and has a genetic predisposition that promotes adverse response to viral challenge." (5)

In October 2000, the Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association published a study that was undertaken by Dodds and Lisa Twark, DVM. The purpose of the study was to assess whether serum canine parvovirus (CPV) and canine distemper virus (CDV) antibody titers, (titer tests are discussed later in this chapter) could determine revaccination protocols in healthy dogs. For this study, 1,441 dogs were used ranging in age from six weeks to seventeen years.

The interval between the last vaccination and the antibody measurement using a titer test was from one to two years for the majority of dogs, 60 percent, and two to seven years for 30.3 percent, and one year for 9.6 percent of the dogs used in the study. The conclusion arrived at by Drs. Twark and Dodds: “The high prevalence of adequate antibody responses (CPV 95.1%; CDV 97.6%) in this large population of dogs suggests that annual revaccination against CPV and CDV may not be necessary. (6)<

All packages of vaccinations carry warnings that they should be injected only in healthy animals. In the case of cats, vaccine manufacturers advise against vaccinating pregnant or nursing cats. However, many pets are not healthy when vaccinated although they might not have outward signs of health problems. Charles Loops, DVM, a holistic veterinarian from Pittsboro, North Carolina, notes that "chemically killed viruses or bacteria are injected directly into the blood stream, which is an unnatural route of infection." (7) This causes the animal’s antibodies to attempt to fight off the offending virus molecules and render them harmless. If the animal’s immune system is too weakened, he or she cannot fight off these viruses and can develop a reaction to the vaccine. Even small amounts of a virus that is introduced through a vaccination may be too much for sick animals to fight off. They then may fall ill from the very disease to which they have been vaccinated.

If you have concerns about vaccinating your pet, Michael Lemmon, DVM, suggests the following: "First, don't vaccinate your dog or cat when he is showing any signs of illness. If your pet is already ill, his immune system may not be able to produce antibodies the vaccination is supposed to stimulate; and he stands a chance of being overwhelmed by the small amount of virus in the vaccine, and succumbing to the illness he’s being vaccinated against." (8)

Some veterinarians believe that vaccines are outright damaging to our pets. Dr. Loops writes in an article, "Veterinarians and animal guardians have to come to realize that they are not protecting animals from disease by annual vaccinations, but in fact, are destroying the health and immune system of these same animals they love and care for." (9) In the same article, Christina Chambreau, DVM, Founder and Chairperson of the Academy of Veterinary Homeopathy, expresses similar views: "Routine vaccinations are probably the worst thing that we do for our animals. They cause all types of illnesses but not directly to where we would relate them definitely to be caused by the vaccine."(10)

Cats and Vaccinations

In the early 1990s the vaccination of cats was beginning to draw concern from cat owners as well as from veterinarians who noted that cats were developing tumors within weeks and months of being vaccinated.

DVM Magazine ran an interesting article on the possible connection between vaccinations and feline sarcomas. "In 1998, Mattie J. Hendrick, DVM, a pathologist with the University of Pennsylvania School of Veterinary Medicine, began to notice something odd," writes Lynn Brakeman, senior editor of DVM Magazine "out of the thousands of biopsies she was analyzing each week, a surprising number of cats (and cats only) were showing the same kind of inflammatory lesion at vaccine sites. By 1990, she and her colleagues had diagnosed a surprising number of fibrosarcomas in the dorsal portion of the neck and interscapular regions of cats." (11) But the question still remained as to what was causing the sarcomas to develop in cats receiving these vaccinations and how many cats were actually succumbing to fibrosarcomas?

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Ann Martin's Second Edition of her wonderful book.  See above for details

Ann Martin's book about vaccinations and other poisons our pets are victims of.