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[linnea]

[hypothesis]
1.  Factory has rat problem.
2.  Hiram the mailroom boy gets promoted to assistant rat catcher and places poison on top of wheat gluten processor.
3.  Vibration from equipment jitters the block of rat poison into the wheat hopper
4.  Tragedy ensues
[/hypothesis]

The tainted food came from Emporia, KANSAS. Aminopterin is not registered for killing rodents in the United States, according to the Environmental Protection Agency, though it is used as a cancer drug.

Also, the "wheat gluten" was a shite defense. They were looking for a straw man, and the "new gluten supplier" was it. For all we know, this could have been an intentional poisoning. Nobody knows yet.

[jaydub]

Longest undefended border in the Western Hemisphere...

(Russia or China have to have longer ones, right?)
(Borders)

[Arachno-capitalist]

So yea, rat poison in the pet food...

I was wrong.

[Nabubrush]

So yea, rat poison in the pet food...

I was wrong.

Way to be a man about it - you get a can.

I'll respond to your question when I have more time.

[AugustWest]

Note that we still don't know how the rat poison got into the pet food.  Was it a freak accident, negligence by the manufacturer or intentional tampering by some evil-doer.  If the latter then there's still reason to be nervous...

[littlefallsmets]

I read somewheres that they think the poisoned element came from China and I'm thinking that if this is proven, we are going to hear a lot of racism from Fox News about Asian culture and poisoned pets.

They will think it is funny but they will pretty much just be assholes.

[Bobby Isosceles]

I read somewheres that they think the poisoned element came from China and I'm thinking that if this is proven, we are going to hear a lot of racism from Fox News about Asian culture and poisoned pets.

They will think it is funny but they will pretty much just be assholes.

Plus, they eat rats over there!

[Doc]

I thought it was cats.
Or is that just the take-out places?

[jaydub]

Scientific American's online site has a nice summary about the state of the investigation.  A couple interesting points:

• The contaminant(s) may have been deliberately introduced into the gluten to boost the apparent protein levels (fraudulently)
• It looks like someone took the recalled pet food and sold it as hog-feed.  Clearly, they missed the point of the recall...
• European and African cases of poisoning have also turned up, linked back to the Chinese suppliers of gluten
• The Chinese government is finally, reluctantly, beginning to cooperate - no longer actively impeding the investigation

I wonder how long it'll be before one of the Law-and-Order shows does a story based on this.

[wombat]

Good article, thanks for the link.

Nervewracking related piece in the Washington Post (might require registration):
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04/22/AR2007042201163.html

Here's the nervousmaking part:

Currently, most of the world's vitamins are manufactured in China. Unable to compete, the last U.S. plant making vitamin C closed a year ago. One of Europe's largest citric acid plants shut last winter, and only one vitamin C manufacturer operates in the West. Given China's cheap labor, artificially low prices and the unfair competitive climate it has foisted on the industry, few Western producers of food ingredients can survive much longer.

Western companies have had to invest heavily in Chinese facilities. These Western-owned plants follow strict standards and are generally better managed than their locally owned counterparts. Nevertheless, 80 percent of the world's vitamin C is now manufactured in China -- much of it unregulated and some of it of questionable quality.