What was the source of the pet food contamination?
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is focusing on contaminated wheat gluten from Xuzhou Anying Biologic Technology Development Co. Ltd., a trading company in China, as the most likely source of contamination. Xuzhou Anying’s general manager maintains that his company did not export goods and that they are looking into who may have exported their product. The wheat gluten was imported by ChemNutra and distributed to Menu Foods. Wheat gluten is used as a filler and as a protein source in pet foods. On March 23, 2007 the compound aminopterin, used as a rat poison, was found in samples of the recalled pet food. However, the Animal Poison Control Center said that the source of contamination may not be fully understood because the “clinical signs reported in cats affected by the contaminated foods are not fully consistent with the ingestion of the rat poison containing aminopterin.” On March 30, the FDA said that a form of melamine was discovered by multiple researchers in the food, in sa
