Delicious or deadly: Purina responds to class action lawsuit against Beneful

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Delicious or deadly: Purina responds to class action lawsuit against Beneful


The Purina pet food empire has been hit with a class action lawsuit alleging that Beneful dog food is responsible for killing thousands of dogs. Beneful has had poor reviews online for years- all one has to do is Goggle search “Beneful petitions” to see that several thousand people do in fact want the brand discontinued from Purina’s catalogue.

Beneful is one of the more popular Purina dog foods- mainly due to its very low retail price, accessibility and claims to be a “nutritious” and “balanced” dog food. However according to the Feb. 5 class action lawsuit filed in a California federal court by plaintiff Frank Lucido, Beneful causes illness and sometimes death.





According to Top Class Actions:

“Lucido owned three dogs — a German Shepherd, an English Bulldog and a Labrador. He bought a bag of Beneful for the first time in late December 2014 or early January 2015 and each dog began eating Beneful exclusively, the Beneful class action lawsuit explains."

"On Jan. 15, the German Shepherd began to lose a large amount of hair and began giving off a unusual odor, which concerned Lucido and his wife, who first started to notice the symptoms. Two days later the German Shepherd became “violently ill.”

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“After being examined by a veterinarian, it was determined that the German Shepherd was suffering from internal bleeding in the dog’s stomach and the liver was also malfunctioning, which the veterinarian said was “consistent with poisoning.”

“On Jan. 23, Lucido’s wife found the English Bulldog dead in their yard. “Post-mortem veterinary examination revealed signs of internal bleeding in the dog’s stomach and lesions on his liver, much like [the German Shepherd],” the class action lawsuit claims.”

Ludido’s third dog has also become ill and he will be testing to see if the pet is suffering from the same illness as the other two. He also claims that he has “suffered economic losses including the purchase price of Beneful and veterinary and related medical expenses” due to the damage that the Beneful dog food allegedly caused.

On Feb. 25 Beneful by Purina addressed the situation posting “a class action lawsuit was recently filed against Beneful. We believe this lawsuit to be baseless and intend to vigorously defend our high quality, nutritious food, which is backed by Purina’s strict quality controls and comprehensive food safety program. Beneful is enjoyed by millions of dogs every day and consumers can continue to feed Beneful with total confidence,” to their Facebook page. They also posted a link to their FAQs and their phone number 1-800-877-7551.


“Lucido is looking to represent two classes,” according to Top Class Actions, “a nationwide class and a California subclass for dog owners ‘who purchased Beneful dog food in the past four years and who incurred any out of pocket costs due to illness, injury or death of their dog resulting from the ingestion of Beneful.’” Visit Top Class Actions to get the full details.

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