The-Truth-About-Pet-Foods

Further, such tests are found to be ineffective. In a recent issue of the
Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association, Dr. David
Dzanis of the FDA Center for Veterinary Medicine stated, “The formulation
method does not account for palatability or availability of
nutrients. Yet a feeding trial can miss some chronic deficiencies or
toxicities.” Dr. Rogers of the University of California stated, “Some
foods that pass the feeding trial still won’t support animals over the
long term…The maintenance protocol lasts only 6 months, the effects
of an excess might not cause a problem for several years.” 1
In short, feeding trials in no way assure animal owners that optimal
health will be maintained if the tested products are fed exclusively
over a lifetime. The best “feeding trials” are with at-home, wellloved
companion animals. 2
1. Wysong Health Letter, “Nutritionists Seeing the Light,” 1997; 11(11):3. J Am
Vet Med Assoc, 1993:1400.
2. Wysong Health Letter, “A Letter from Dr. Wysong Regarding Animal Testing,”
1997; 11(11):1:
Dear Friend:
There are very few animal or human experiments that are really necessary.
But, I must admit that early on we were guilty of some of this nonsense. We did
a few animal-feeding studies under pressure by customers (not to excuse my
own naiveté) to create the kind of “scientific data” they were used to looking at,
or were told by others to look for. We stopped jumping through these hoops
when I could not justify holding animals in cages, regardless of how nicely we
treated them, to prove what was already obvious to any thinking person. I’m
sure sales are lost because we are not performing AAFCO (American Association
of Feed Control Officials) laboratory feeding trials to brag “100% complete
and balanced perfect nutrition” malarkey.
Nonsense to create sales is not right. I sleep better at night knowing that no
animal is caged in a laboratory somewhere (to prove what is obvious to any
“thinking person”) for our profit. There are some things that simply need no
proof.
Laboratory proofs are just assurances and corroboration of what is already
evident. Common sense tells us what is required for optimal health. What
would you think if I told you that the only way we could know what lions,
bears, ants, elephants, rhinoceroses, hyenas, robins, or eagles should eat would
be to cage several of each, and then perform long, complicated, placebo-controlled,
double-blind, crossover, scientific feeding studies You would say,
“What I already know what they should eat. It’s what they’re already eating.”
We don’t need some food scientist or nutritionist to tell us how many
milligrams of vitamin B 6
, international units of vitamin E, or grams of protein,
creatures need. They obviously get what they need by eating their raw, whole,
natural food. The simplicity of this is so overwhelming it is essentially passed
over by the entire food industry and scientific community. What does your pet
need to eat The answer: What it would eat if it were released into the wild.
What should you eat What you would eat if you were released into the wild.
Granted, today’s humans and companion animals cannot be released into the
wild, but that does not mean we should not model our diets to retain as much of
the character of the archetypal pattern as it is possible to achieve.
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