{"id":2723,"date":"2025-01-19T15:18:13","date_gmt":"2025-01-19T15:18:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/healthyretirementnews.com\/index.php\/2025\/01\/19\/with-bird-flu-cases-rising-certain-kinds-of-pet-food-may-be-risky-for-animals-and-people\/"},"modified":"2025-01-19T15:18:13","modified_gmt":"2025-01-19T15:18:13","slug":"with-bird-flu-cases-rising-certain-kinds-of-pet-food-may-be-risky-for-animals-and-people","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/healthyretirementnews.com\/index.php\/2025\/01\/19\/with-bird-flu-cases-rising-certain-kinds-of-pet-food-may-be-risky-for-animals-and-people\/","title":{"rendered":"With bird flu cases rising, certain kinds of pet food may be risky for animals \u2013 and people"},"content":{"rendered":"

When Jamila Acfalle decided to get her first cat, she had one requirement: It had to be brave. <\/p>\n

Acfalle is a dog trainer in a suburb of Portland, Oregon. She works with dogs that have behavior problems that put them at risk of rehoming or euthanasia. She needed a cat who wouldn\u2019t be intimidated by the large, bouncy canines she brings home. <\/p>\n

When she met a litter of long-haired Maine Coons in 2021, the smoke gray kitten who walked straight up to her and sat at her feet was the one. <\/p>\n

Because her dog\u2019s name is Hero, she named the cat Villain. The cat was friendly and silly but quickly learned to put the dogs in their place. Perhaps because she was already so used to working with dogs, Acfalle trained her to walk on a leash so she could take walks with her fur brothers. <\/p>\n

She also wanted to be sure that Villain ate a high quality diet. Like a growing number of pet owners in the US, she liked the idea of giving her pets raw food, which she believes is healthier since it was less processed than dry kibble and perhaps more similar to what animals eat in the wild. <\/p>\n

Americans\u2019 interest in raw foods \u2014 for pets and humans \u2014 has surged, fueled by a growing distrust in highly processed foods and chemical additives. <\/p>\n

Infectious disease experts, however, say the trend goes too far, since it abandons tried-and-true safety steps \u2014 including heating milk and cooking meats \u2014 that kill dangerous viruses and bacteria. In the era of bird flu, they say raw milk and raw pet food are bringing a dangerous virus with pandemic potential too close to people and pets. <\/p>\n

On Friday, the US Food and Drug Administration announced it is tracking multiple cases of H5N1 in domestic and wild cats, including cases linked to contaminated pet food. The FDA advised that while dogs can also be infected, their symptoms are usually milder. Cats, however, are at greater risk. <\/p>\n

The agency directed pet food manufacturers to consider the risk of bird flu in their required food safety plans, including adding a step to cook animal products like milk, meat or eggs, or adding supply chain controls to ensure that the products they\u2019re using in their food don\u2019t come from infected flocks or herds. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe encourage consumers to carefully consider the risk of this emerging pathogen before feeding their pets uncooked meat or an uncooked pet food product,\u201d the agency said. <\/p>\n

Acfalle said she researched several brands while deciding on Villain\u2019s diet and looked for one she thought was taking extra steps to be safe. <\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re just frozen little nuggets. And you scoop them out, and they defrost, and you smash it down, and it\u2019s just raw meat, organ and bone. And she had been eating that her whole life\u201d and thriving, Acfalle said. <\/p>\n

Until she wasn\u2019t. <\/p>\n

\n
<\/div>\n
\n
Jamila Acfalle wanted a cat who wouldn’t have a problem with the dogs she trained, and she says she found that in Villain.<\/span> <\/div>
Courtesy Jamila Acfalle<\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Just after Thanksgiving, Villain <\/strong>spent eight days with an illness that confounded their local vets. First, she stopped eating, then she stopped going to the bathroom, and she began to struggle with balance and coordination. <\/p>\n

As her condition worsened, Acfalle bought a variety of foods, making a kitty smorgasbord of different smells, trying to entice her to eat. Instead, Villain tried to smash her face into the food. <\/p>\n

\u201cAnd then she was just walking back and forth,\u201d Acfalle said. The pacing went on for hours. \u201cShe wouldn\u2019t stay still. She\u2019s just constantly moving, and she\u2019s trying to lay down, but then she wakes up as if something\u2019s trying to get her, and she\u2019s scared.\u201d <\/p>\n

The next morning, Villain was barely able to open her eyes. Acfalle rushed her cat to an emergency animal hospital, but it was too late. Villain\u2019s brain had begun to swell, and she died in Acfalle\u2019s arms. <\/p>\n

In shock and disbelief that she\u2019d lost her beloved 4-year-old companion, Acfalle took the extraordinary step of sending Villain\u2019s body to Oregon State University for a necropsy, to find out why she died. <\/p>\n

The phone call she got next was devastating. <\/p>\n

It was H5N1 bird flu, and state officials said it came from a contaminated batch of the Northwest Naturals pet food that Acfalle had fed her own pets and recommended to her clients. <\/strong> <\/p>\n

\u201cI really wanted it to come back as a blood pathogen or something that couldn\u2019t have been in my control, but I felt responsible for choosing that for her, for choosing a raw lifestyle for her,\u201d Acfalle said. \u201cI felt responsible.\u201d <\/p>\n

Acfalle said she had to take Tamiflu to ensure that Villain had not passed the infection to her. As another precaution against spreading the virus, she wasn\u2019t allowed to have Villain\u2019s ashes after her cremation. <\/p>\n

Raw foods bring bird flu closer to pets and people<\/h2>\n

H5N1 infections are rare in American pets, but they\u2019ve become increasingly common over the past two years as the virus has begun to circulate in a growing variety of animals, including dairy cows and farmed poultry like turkey and chicken. <\/p>\n

Cats are particularly vulnerable to the virus. As with chickens, the virus can invade their brains and cause devastating neurologic complications. <\/p>\n

Since December 2022, at least 74 pet cats have tested positive for bird flu across the United States, according to data from the US Department of Agriculture. Domestic cats are the third most common detection of H5N1 in non-farm mammals in the US, behind red foxes and mice. <\/strong> <\/p>\n

That official tally of infected cats is almost certainly an undercount, too. <\/p>\n

\u201cWith foodborne disease, we capture a small percentage of them,\u201d said Dr. J. Scott Weese, a veterinarian and professor at Ontario Veterinary College at the University of Guelph in Canada. Weese specializes in the study of zoonotic infections \u2014 infections that spread between people and animals. <\/p>\n

Weese said cats usually get less vet care than dogs, so they are in clinics a lot less often. When cats get the flu, they can deteriorate very quickly and may not show signs of illness until it\u2019s too late. <\/p>\n

To be added to the official count, animals not only have to be seen in a vet\u2019s office, they have to be tested, and those test results have to be reported to the state, which has to confirm them. Pet owners must pay for most of these steps, which can be a further disincentive. <\/p>\n

\u201cYou might have a cat that\u2019s looking a little bit off in the morning. The owner says \u2018yeah, the cat\u2019s not looking that great. Let\u2019s see what happens,\u2019 \u201d Weese said. \u201cThey might be dead overnight. Most people aren\u2019t going to take their animal in for testing afterward.\u201d <\/p>\n

Joseph Journell of San Bernardino County, California, said he spent thousands of dollars trying to understand why three of his cats suddenly became gravely ill in November. <\/p>\n

Two of his cats, a 4-year-old black and white kitty named Tuxsie and a 14-year-old tabby named Alexander the Great, died. <\/p>\n

A third cat, Big Boy, became critically ill. He went blind and lost the ability to walk. Veterinarians at a specialty animal hospital were able to test his urine for bird flu. After weeks of aggressive treatment, including the antiviral drug Tamiflu, he has recovered. <\/p>\n

All three of <\/strong>the cats, who lived indoors, drank raw milk from a batch that was later recalled by Raw Farm dairy after it tested positive for the H5N1 virus. Journell said that a fourth cat who did not drink the milk never got sick. <\/p>\n

\n
<\/div>\n
\n
Joseph Journell lost two of his cats to bird flu.<\/span> <\/div>
KCBS\/KCAL<\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

For weeks starting in December, California-based Raw Farm was quarantined and stopped producing and distributing its raw milk. It has since resumed sales after clearing the required tests. The company disputes that its milk made Journell\u2019s cats ill, but he remains convinced. <\/p>\n

Journell also drank the Raw Farm milk and developed mild symptoms, including a low fever, which started around the same time the cats got sick. He saw doctors twice, he said. The first time was before the cats had been diagnosed, and he wasn\u2019t tested for bird flu because his symptoms were mild and neither he nor the doctors realized he had been exposed. <\/p>\n

After his cats tested positive, he called his doctors back, and they encouraged him to go to the emergency room. Doctors there took blood and ran a battery of tests, but Journell said he didn\u2019t test positive for flu. <\/p>\n

Aside from consuming the same products, there may be other, less obvious ways raw pet foods put people at risk, including that many people prepare their pets\u2019 foods in the same space where they prepare their own. <\/strong> <\/p>\n

\u201cThose can, of course, contaminate your counters. They can contaminate your utensils, your knives, your cutting boards and so on,\u201d said Dr. Andrea Love, an immunologist and microbiologist who writes the ImmunoLogic newsletter on Substack. \u201cWhile I would love to believe that everyone has really impeccable kitchen hygiene, we know that that\u2019s simply not the case.\u201d <\/p>\n

Pets might spread food around their bowls where kids or shoes might pick it up, or expose people to germs later, when they\u2019re cleaning out a litter box. <\/p>\n

At the moment, H5N1 isn\u2019t very good at infecting people because the receptors it uses to enter cells don\u2019t match the receptors that most common in the human nose and throat. But that could change, she noted. <\/p>\n

The more contact the virus has with humans, the more it will learn to adapt to us. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe cats are the canaries in the coal mine,\u201d said Bill Marler, a Seattle attorney who specializes in foodborne illness cases; an attorney in Marler\u2019s firm is representing Journell. \u201cIt\u2019s just a matter of time before that raw milk contaminated with bird flu or cat food contaminated with bird flu makes a human sick.\u201d <\/p>\n

A growing and risky trend<\/h2>\n

Grocery stores and pet stores now have whole aisles for frozen and refrigerated pet foods, including raw foods, which are more expensive than dry kibble. The Business Research Company, a market research firm, projects that the raw pet food market will nearly double in size from 2024 to 2028, expanding from $3.7 billion to $6.4 billion. <\/p>\n

Raw food typically contains meat and may also have added fiber, vitamins and minerals. Raw milk is also sold as pet food in many states. <\/p>\n

Whether pre-made or made at home, vets and infectious disease experts say there are no nutritional advantages to feeding raw diets, and the risks of raw food outweigh any potential benefits, particularly with bird flu circulating. <\/p>\n

Raw foods can contain debris, like shards of bone, that may injure pets. Studies have linked some types of raw diets to serious nutritional imbalances, especially when people try to mix their own at home. And tests of raw products show that they are frequently contaminated with harmful viruses and bacteria such as salmonella and E. coli. <\/p>\n

\u201cWild animals don\u2019t live that long in the wild for various reasons. Foodborne disease is presumably one of them,\u201d Weese said. <\/p>\n

The idea that raw food is healthier because it is closer to the diets of wild animals isn\u2019t correct, he said. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe little fluffy dog is sitting on your couch is very much removed from a wolf or a fox in terms of its intestinal tract, intestinal bacteria, its physiology. They aren\u2019t just wild animals that we moved into our house today. They\u2019ve evolved with us and changed with us,\u201d Weese said. <\/p>\n

Raw foods may not say so on the package<\/h2>\n

The FDA says there\u2019s no formal or regulatory definition of \u201craw\u201d pet food. Although most companies that sell uncooked foods label them \u201craw\u201d as a selling point, it is not required. Some freeze-dried pet treats are made with raw meat, for example, but aren\u2019t necessarily labeled that way. <\/p>\n

Companies often use the term \u201craw\u201d to indicate that a product has not undergone heat treatment. The foods may undergo other types of treatments designed to reduce pathogens, including high-pressure processing, acidification or irradiation, \u201chowever, their effectiveness on viral pathogens such as H5N1 is unknown at this time,\u201d the FDA said in a statement. <\/p>\n

The Northwest Naturals frozen turkey that Villain ate had been treated with high-pressure processing, a method the company says kills harmful germs while leaving beneficial microbes intact. <\/p>\n

Acfalle said some people may think she was reckless for choosing raw food for her pets, but she had seen raw diets improve the health of dogs she trained by cutting down on digestive problems like diarrhea. <\/p>\n

\n
<\/div>\n
\n
“She loved being in charge of all the dogs,” Acfalle said of Villain. “She was a dog training cat, for sure.”<\/span> <\/div>
Courtesy Jamila Acfalle<\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

After Villain died, the state tested bags of unopened and opened bags of Northwest Naturals products in Acfalle\u2019s home. Only the opened bag of turkey food was positive for bird flu; the strain of the H5N1 virus in the frozen turkey was a genetic match to the strain that killed Villain. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe are confident that this cat contracted H5N1 by eating the Northwest Naturals raw and frozen pet food,\u201d Oregon State Veterinarian Dr. Ryan Scholz said in a news release. <\/p>\n

The FDA is attempting to trace the source of the contamination in the turkey. <\/p>\n

In a Q&A on its website, the company says it doesn\u2019t know how the food became contaminated with H5N1 or why the high-pressure treatment didn\u2019t seem to kill the virus. It said it is continuing to investigate, working closely with state and federal authorities and waiting for more answers in the investigation. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe remain fully confident in our rigorous quality controls and our ability to ensure that our safe and nutritious food is in our customers\u2019 hands. Nothing is more important to us than the safety of our products and that of our customers\u2019 beloved pets,\u201d the statement said. <\/p>\n

There are processes in place to prevent products from sick animals from entering the food supply. <\/p>\n

When chickens or turkeys catch bird flu, they typically get very ill quickly and affected farms are placed under quarantine by state regulators and depopulated, or culled, to prevent further spread of the infection. <\/p>\n

Quarantine also means no birds or bird products, such as eggs, can leave the facility except for state-approved disposal. This should prevent meat or eggs from infected birds from entering the food supply, according to the USDA\u2019s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service. <\/p>\n

Pet foods are regulated at both the federal and state level, and companies that make them are inspected. These inspections are risk-based, meaning their frequency depends on how risky the ingredients, process and facility are. <\/p>\n

Northwest Naturals was last inspected in March, according to the Oregon Department of Agriculture, and had no violations. It was considered low risk. <\/p>\n

The FDA has published guidelines for raw food manufacturers that suggest using only ingredients that have been inspected by the USDA and passed for human consumption, but these recommendations are nonbinding and have no legal authority. <\/p>\n

Since late last year, Warnings to pet owners have started pop up. <\/p>\n

After Villain died in December, Oregon warned pet owners to avoid two lots of Northwest Naturals frozen raw turkey, and the company recalled the food, which was sold through distributors in 12 states as well as British Columbia. <\/p>\n

\n
<\/div>\n
\n
Northwest Naturals recalled some of its Feline Turkey Recipe raw pet food in December.<\/span> <\/div>
Northwest Naturals<\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

In December, the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health issued an animal health alert that several indoor-only cats had died after consumption of raw pet foods and counseling veterinarians to ask owners about feeding raw products to their pets. <\/p>\n

Los Angeles County also advised people not to feed their pets another raw brand, Monarch Raw Pet Food, after cats who ate it became ill with bird flu. Samples of the food, which had been sold at local farmers markets, also tested positive for H5 virus. <\/p>\n

No recall has been issued for Monarch\u2019s products. In a statement on its website, the company said that it is \u201ccommitted to the health and safety of pets and their owners\u201d and that \u201cthere is currently no credible evidence to suggest that our raw food products are linked to avian influenza or any other health risks.\u201d <\/p>\n

After Raw Farm milk and cream were recalled due to bird flu, the farm was quarantined for weeks and California health officials warned consumers against drinking the products or feeding it pets. In a statement on its website, Raw Farm said \u201cthere are no illnesses associated with H5N1 in our products, but rather this is a political issue. There are no food safety issues with our products or consumer safety.\u201d <\/p>\n

Reckoning with the risks<\/h2>\n

The news that contaminated raw food led to Villain\u2019s illness was a bitter pill for many pet owners who swear by it. <\/strong>On the company\u2019s Facebook page, fans questioned whether the cat might have gotten sick from being outdoors and somehow those germs got back into the bag of opened food tested by the state. <\/p>\n

The Oregon Department of Agriculture said it considered the possibility of cross-contamination early in its investigation. It said the strain of H5N1 that infected Villain was closely related to the strain that\u2019s circulating in cattle, and there aren\u2019t any cattle infections in Oregon, so the agency doesn\u2019t believe cat could have gotten it from its outdoor environment. <\/p>\n

Acfalle said that although Villain was sometimes out on a leash, she hadn\u2019t been outside for weeks leading up to her illness because it was too cold. <\/p>\n

Both Journell and Acfalle are seeking compensation from the companies that produced their food. <\/p>\n

\n
<\/div>\n
\n
Joseph Journell says he still has the empty Raw Farm milk jugs.<\/span> <\/div>
Courtesy Joseph Journell<\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Journell said he has the empty milk jugs from Raw Farm, his receipts showing when he purchased them and the test results from his sick cat, Big Boy, showing that he had bird flu. <\/p>\n

His attorney recently sent a letter to Mark McAfee, the founder of Raw Farm, asking him to reimburse Journell for tens of thousands of dollars in vet bills, lost wages and other out-of-pocket expenses. <\/p>\n

McAfee said he doesn\u2019t believe that his raw milk could be the source of the cats\u2019 infections since recent studies have shown that the concentration of virus in raw milk drops after several days in the refrigerator. McAfee also said no other pet owners or people have approached him to say they believe they or their pets were sickened by Raw Farm milk. <\/p>\n

Journell said he had been unaware of bird flu and had not heard public health warnings related to H5N1 in raw milk until his cats got sick. <\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m not a scientist, but I have done some research,\u201d Journell said. Based on his reading online, he believed that if it was processed correctly and refrigerated quickly, good bacteria in raw milk would \u201ctake care\u201d of any harmful germs. <\/p>\n

\n
    \n
  • Sign up here to get The Results Are In with Dr. Sanjay Gupta<\/strong> every Friday from the CNN Health team.<\/li>\n
      <\/ul>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n

      This is a myth, according to the FDA: Raw milk doesn\u2019t rid itself of dangerous pathogens. <\/p>\n

      Studies have shown that the bird flu virus is present in high concentrations in milk from infected cows and can remain infectious for days. <\/p>\n

      Journell said he still believes in raw milk, although he\u2019s not drinking it for the time being. \u201cI do believe it has its benefits and is really good for you,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

      After Villain died, Acfalle switched her dogs to dried, heat-treated kibble for about a month, but she said they didn\u2019t do well. She said several of them have digestive problems that came back when she switched away from a raw diet. <\/p>\n

      Acfalle\u2019s dogs are service dogs, and she feels like she can\u2019t expect them to work if they\u2019re not feeling well. She switched them back to raw food, this time from a different brand. <\/p>\n

      \u201cI still believe in raw feeding,\u201d she said, but it also feels like \u201cRussian roulette\u201d \u2014 \u201cpossibly risking my dog\u2019s life because some company is not taking the proper precautions.\u201d <\/p>\n<\/p>\n

      This post appeared first on cnn.com<\/div>\n

      <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

      When Jamila Acfalle decided to get her first cat, she had one requirement: It had…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2724,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2723","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-health-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/healthyretirementnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2723","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/healthyretirementnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/healthyretirementnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/healthyretirementnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/healthyretirementnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2723"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/healthyretirementnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2723\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/healthyretirementnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2724"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/healthyretirementnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2723"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/healthyretirementnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2723"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/healthyretirementnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2723"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}