No it doesn't seem fair at all but then nothing about this whole situation has been fair. Even if we ignore the falsehoods that brought us here in the first place.

The way the compassion fund itself was set up wasn't fair - there was absolutely no consideration given to owners whose cats were amongst the first to become ill and who had to pay for test after test whilst vets tried to work out what was going on. All cats did not become equally ill nor stay ill for the same length of time (dependent on lots of things), some owners paid for post morteums to try and help others find out what was going on.  Only very limited items were covered by the compassion fund which left most people still significantly out of pocket even if all the allowed costs were covered which for most did not happen anyway. The time frame for the fund was very narrow and it was obvious when it was set up that most cats would not have recovered by the closing date of the fund and would still need ongoing veterinary care to maintain their improvement and continue on the road to recovery. Some cats collapsed and ended up dying just days after the fund closed - what about the costs these poor babies incurred for their frantic and then devasted owners.

What about the cats that were excluded from the fund that died of organ failure prior to becoming wobbley - Champion would not even acknowledge their deaths and yet we have seen a spate of wobbley cats die of organ failure since this started. And these cats weren't old sickly cats they were young apparently healthy cats that sickened and died after eating Orijen who like the wobbley cats did not respond to conventional treatments and whose kidney or pancreas or heart or........? just suddenly stopped working with none of the symptoms you would normally expect to see. These cats too accrued expensive vet bills but as I said they are totally ignored by Champion.

And what about the vets that were helping us who paid for all their extra hours they put in trying to help us, for the tests they had run and didn't charge for as they knew the burden we were all under. For their calls to colleagues all over the world trying to work out what was going on, and once they knew trying to work out how to help. For the pressure they were under trying to deliver help and seeing cats they knew sicken and die. In some cases their own cats and their nursing staffs cats sicken and die.

And then there are is the issue of test results that were promised not being released, the version of the truth that was forth coming being dependent on who at Champion was making the comments and what they thought those listening knew, the changing story, the posting of inaccuracies on their website that when challenged they acknowledged in other places but never corrected on their site. The changing of the date for the compassion fund which when challenged was "a mistake". The passing of deadlines that they themself have set without any communication to affected owners. The failure to acknowledge let alone answer correspondence from affected owners and their vets. Need we go on if anyone reads the pages of this post and those on the Orijen thread at Itchmo they can form their own opinion of what has happened.

So as you can see fairness is not something anyone that has any knowledge of this situation, least of all affected owners and their vets, have come to expect from Champion.

Glad to hear a couple of people have received additional reimbursement from Champion. I have been communicating with other owners of the victims of Champion foods and like us they have received no correspondence, no answers to the emails they have sent and certainly no further reimbursement of their costs either prior to the end of the fund or ongoing costs which for some have also been considerable. One owner has yet to hear anything about the review of her initial compensation as she received far under the $2000/cat cap set by Champion.

I have to say one of the worst parts of this horrendous episode in our lives has been the way things have been handled by Champion. Lots of spin about how concerned and caring they are but very little action to support the spin.

Jo

Interestingly enough whilst I can't find anything regarding the US chicken meal on their website. The site still professes the product is made from fresh regional ingredients. However the following link was posted on Itchmo

http://docs.google.com/fileview?id=0B-LDrRDG112PZGYxNDgzYmItZDg1MC00OGQ5LTk4ODEtYjkzYjRhNjVmMTky&hl=en

What the FOI documents show is they were using US chicken meal in there products in Aug 2007 when their Australian import permit was granted and nothing changed in regard to ingredients till Nov 2008 when their last shipment came in or their would have been documents to that affect sent to the Australian govt and they would have been released with the reset of the documents under the FOI. So when exactly are they planning to add this information to their site so consumers are actually aware of where ingredients are sourced and given what we now know you do have to wonder what else is not a "fresh regional ingredient".

Jo

I have just received advice that the Australian contact for the compassion fund has been advised that they are to close their file on this matter and all correspondence should be sent directly to Champion foods. This I imagine means anyone that has directed correspondence through him to Champion re: claims in excess of $2000/cat and ongoing expenses will need to contact Champion directly about these matters even if documentation has already been submitted through him.

Jo

Thanks for posting this information TCM. Becomes more and more obvious that what Champion say and what they actually do has little in common. The documents released and what they show, the way they initially addressed veterinary concerns about Orijen and what it was doing to our pets, the way Australian vicitms have been treated, the spin Orijen put on things for example their knowledge of the irradiation & their input into the Australian govts decision when they have not bothered contacting the govt at all in this regard, their failure to release information despite their promisesto do so, their failure to keep vicitms informed of what is happening and many other things all make me very concerned for other owners and their pets who are drawn into thinking that this company's food is a safe option. Surely whether something is safe or not has a lot to do with the integrity of the company making the food. IMO given what we have been through and are still going through this would have to viewed skeptically in the case of Champion.

Thank you to those who have done all the hard work and got this information released.

Jo

After what we have been through we will be wanting to rule food out before anything else if we have a sick animal for an unexplained reason from here on in.

Bonkers I agree, a register certainly only deals with identifying patterns of illness, it as you said isn't a solution to the problems with pet food that are caused by lack of truth in labelling, poor ingredients and substitution of ingredients, poor processing practises, lack of batch testing etc.

And that is part of the problem we face animals are lost and others further endangered whilst we are trying to eliminate things other than the food. That is what we went through with Champion in Australia our cats gradually got sick one at a time and not necessarily all with exactly the same symptoms and we tested and checked and tried to work out what was going on and we are all working in isolation and then gradually as animals are sent to the same specialist centre they relieve there are common issues and start looking for a common cause. One of the clinics then put out a survey and pet lists and that turned up other cases and gave us more information. This all takes months unfortunately and people are spending money on unnecessary testing to eliminate things that have already been eliminated by someone else unknown to them. And in the mean time people are still feeding the food that is causing the damage not knowing what has caused the problem. And then when there is finally enough evidence to point the finger at a food we can't get it off the shelf we have to deal with PFC's and hope they will do a volunteer recall and even if they do there is no requirement on them to notify retail outlets to remove the food.

I do not know the answer as pet food is not always the cause of illness but IMO there needs to be some type of central register so vets can register strange/sudden onset symptoms in animals that have to date been healthy. At least then hopefully common issues can be identified earlier and the poisoning stopped sooner. There will also then be a record of  passed issues so for example in our case the previous issues with irradiated cat food would have been there for the vets to work from.

Jo

Have been thinking about Orijen's response a lot. Whilst it is nice to hear they are considering ongoing costs & accounts over $2000 and so very pleased for those whose cats are being diagnosed still that they have access to the fund I still have to ask why they haven't released test results from the food sampling as they said they would. I question this even more when they talk about their primary and secondary research playing a key part in Australia banning irradiation of cat food. I would ask what research and if they are prepared to release it to the Australian govt why have they not released it to our vets? It has to be remembered we still have ill, paralysed and dying cats and this is not what would be expected based on either the Irish research or Ian Duncan's research. Again I ask Champion to release information to our vets.

Jo

I will be very interested to see what eventuates from this and would like to thank Cats Mother for chasing up Champion and getting a response. I would also like to thank all the people on this list who are supporting us your amazing support IMO has made all the difference.

Jo

I have just heard that we have lost another Orijen cat, rest in pease little Ginger you will always be in your families hearts. And please send some healing thoughts to her family they have now lost both their cats to the affects of Orijen with Smokey passing in March. 

Jo
(I do not know where this will end but the losses seem to be never ending)

My heart bleeds for Diesel's mum what a horrible situation to be in and I certainly understand it after a yr+ of ongoing vet bills caused by the horror that is Orijen and it is clear these bills will be ongoing for an indefinite period if we are to keep out cats moving forward.

If you think Champion's behaviour to date is not acceptable can I please ask you to write to Champion and tell them this is not acceptable behaviour. They have clearly run as quickly as they can from the disaster they caused in Australia. The only way we will get them to review each case on an individual basis as they said they would is to get consumers in the market they care about ie Nth America to demand they do what they said they would and if you are going to write them can I please also ask you to demand they release the results of the testing they have done on the contaminated food. They said they would release these results in December and we are still waiting. What was in the food that was so bad they do not want us to see those results? They said the chemicals found were not neurotoxins but they have yet to tell us what they were. How can we give our recovering cats the care they need if our vets do not have all the information they need to make informed decisions.

If you do not know what happened to our cats here are some videos of a friends affected Birmans one of these beautiful cats is Gus who is now dead from the affects of Orijen

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s2tLHUn1RSA&feature=channel

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aEaXvEbLTVg&feature=channel

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f-78h1pa-ug&feature=channel


We all appreciate everything you have done to date - the support you have given us has been amazing and I hate to ask for more but I am afraid I have to if Orijen is to be made to step up to the line and deliver on their promises.

Jo (With 2 dead cats and 4 cats still affected and needing ongoing care)

That is just totally inadequate and feeding potentially contaminated food to your own cats to prove the point is unbelievable.

Goodluck with testing at MSU once you get those results you will hopefully have a better idea of what is going on.ho

Jo

Hi Taz, I immediately contacted the company whose supplement I was using when these things happened to us the first time and they advised me that they had not heard of any confirmed side effects and wanted me to put my dog back on the supplement to "confirm it happened again" my response was not polite as I had no intention of killing my dog to prove her renal issues were caused by the supplement. I was glad we had done a full blood panel prior to the commencement of the supplement and then tested her again after a couple of weeks (increased renal enzymes found) once we removed the supplement we continued regular blood testing and her renal function returned to normal approx. 3 mths down the track. We lost her a few years later to old age and she still had normal renal function.

I am currently stuck on the laptop due to problems with the desktop so can not access my information but:

This article is interesting and supports what happened to us
http://ndt.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/full/21/7/2031

And if you look there are other side effects though they are uncommon eg:

http://74.125.155.132/search?q=cache:2xJUbuO3_FkJ:ezinearticles.com/%3FSide-Effects-Of-Glucosamine-Chondroitin%26id%3D405454+glucsosamine+%2B+chrondrotin+%2B+side+effects&cd=6&hl=en&ct=clnk

http://www.quackwatch.com/01QuackeryRelatedTopics/DSH/glucosamine.html

The issues with insulin and bleeding may raise concerns for owners of breeders prone to these problems

Don't get me wrong I think this can be a wonderful product when used as a supplement to treat joint pain (have seen some animals and people experience amazing relief) however I feel it should be adequately monitored. Given my experiences I have grave concerns about high levels of it being found in a food, that may form the major component of an animals diet, where consumption may vary and it is consumed by animals indiscriminately and with no awareness of possible risks by owners. There are also

Jo

Any news on sentencing of these greedy individuals. As someone already said amazing that these offences are classed as  misdemeanours. Given the offenses were caused to gain $$$$'s why are the monies they gained from these offences not seized as the profits of crime?

Jo

It would be nice if they mentioned they were batch testing then you might have proof of what they told you if they were willing to release that information. When we brought Orijen they were claiming no Ethoxyquin, BHA or BHT and when we found both BHA & BHT according to the company it was still not a problem as the levels were below maximum allowed limits. Big difference between zero & maximum allowed as far as I'm concerned and since they have still not released any of their test results we are just expected to believe what they say about the levels actually found. Now I am assuming we are being expected to believe their trace level comments.

Missed the bit about the high glucosamine/chrondrotin. I would be concerned about high levels of glucosamine/chondrotin in a food as they can cause high blood pressure and/or impaired renal function in some individuals - have seen it happen with some of my own animals when we tried these products as supplements for joint pain over the years which I have to say they were very good at controlling.

Jo