Change the Station

We hope you enjoyed reading our last post, “Mixed Messages”. We will be re-visiting that topic in today’s post thanks to the latest crap to come rolling down from the “mountain”.

Meet the Hartz Facebook Flea & Tick Care Station:

So, Hartz is going to relieve consumer fears about buying the wrong products by offering their suggestions on what’s safe to use?

You probably know where this is going.

The system works like this. You tell Hartz if you have a cat or a dog, how old the animal is, how much it weighs and where you live in the United States. This “sophisticated” app takes all that data, analyzes it, gives you a coupon for good ole Hartz and makes a postcard for you to tell all your friends about the wonderful deal you just got on some reckless poison.

To be fair, the Care Station doesn’t always recommend Hartz. If you tell the app your animal is under the age or weight limit, it cautions you against using the products, employing cutesy animal graphics. Aww.

Of course, Hartz, has also accounted for the combination of underage and underweight at the same time! What attention to detail:

Okay, so, aside from the expected bias towards Hartz products, what’s the problem?

We’re glad you asked.

In our last post we revealed that Hartz has been sending out messages in direct opposition to their EPA approved labeling, specifically on the subject of age.

As a reminder, here is some of the advice Hartz offers on its Facebook Flea & Tick Education Tab, on the topic of appropriate age:

In this instance, the advice above matches with Hartz’ labeling, though Hartz does not go into nearly as much detail on what they consider elderly on their labels (but that’s a whole other post):

Keeping all this in mind, please watch the following video (for the record, you do not have to be logged in to Facebook to use this app and the music is our addition):

Yep. Although Hartz considers cats to be elderly at 7 years of age and they state on their labeling not to use the products on aged cats, they carelessly tell you to run out and choose from an assortment of Hartz flea & tick “treatments” and apply them to your cat of 10 or more years of age, well over the Company’s definition of “aged”.

If you’re wondering, the same results can be obtained if you select the “7-9 Years” option and, yes, the error occurs on the dog side of the fence too:

As soon as we saw news of this release, we made sure to let Hartz know what was coming:

With today’s post, we believe we delivered on that promise.

P.S. – More on Fitch later.

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Penny’s Finds #5

Generic Over-the-Counter Flea and Tick Medication Containing Tetrachlorvinphos (TCVP) Kills Family Dog [Video]
Derek Demo of CBS 12 News is warning the public that chemicals in over-the-counter flea and tick medications can be dangerous.

The CBS reporter spoke with Jessica Mentz, who recently lost her 1 1/2 year old Boxer, Rocky, after applying less than the recommended amount of a generic over-the-counter flea and tick spray. The main active ingredient in this spray was none other than tetrachlorvinphos, a chemical to which we have previously called attention. See: Tetra-who-vin-what?

Naturally, the manufacturer of the product takes no responsibility.

“They just told me they can guarantee it wasn’t their product. They’ve tested on their animals and it’s never happened.” -Jessica Mentz

Dr. James Esh, a local Veterinarian, strongly disagrees with the manufacturer:

“There are a number of products that are actually the older chemicals we had 30 years ago, when I became a veterinarian and some of those are very, very toxic.”

Broken Hartz applauds Mr. Demo on this piece for its clear public safety message. [KHSL TV]

Speaking of Old, Toxic Chemicals and Shady Companies
June Buggie the cat’s mom, Jen, experienced a close call due to some poor advice given to her from a PetSmart employee. She had come in for Frontline, but the clerk steered her away from it, recommending she treat her medicated dog DeDe with First Shield, the official flea & tick product of PetSmart’s in-house clinic, Banfield Pet Hospital. This treatment, which contains permethrin, is the same active ingredient in Hartz UltraGuard One Spot for Dogs and Puppies. Permethrin, as many of you know, is toxic to cats and, therefore, reputable Veterinarians will not even send someone home with a permethrin product if there is a cat in the house.

Thankfully, Jen knew about permethrin too and noticed the clerk’s error before using the product. First Shield is a Summit Vetpharm LLC product and, at one point, Summit was a direct sibling to Hartz Mountain Corporation, when both brands were primarily owned by Sumitomo Corporation. With Sumitomo selling off primary shares of both companies, the relationship has distanced, but Sumitomo still holds quite a bit of stock in both. In case you’re wondering, Sumitomo is a chemical manufacturer that, among other unsavory patents, holds the rights to none other than permethrin. For the record, recent studies have shown permethrin and all other pyrethrins, pyrethroids and pseudo-pyrethroids to not be as safe for dogs as once believed either.

Be sure to check out June Buggie’s full story on her sibling Rumpy’s excellent blog. [Rumpy Dog]

Meanwhile, on the subject of Banfield, we have nothing good to say. We became aware of them by chance during an incident with a detractor, who just so happened to be a Banfield employee, and were horrified by what we saw:

• Banfield complaints [Consumer Affairs]
• More Banfield complaints [Pissed Consumer]
• Here’s some more, including the comments [Lyzardly]
• Oh, what’s this? A complaint? [Crusty Orange]
• This is getting ridiculous [Yorkie Talk]
• Someone even made a Facebook page! [Banfield Pet Hospital is the Wrong Choice]
• Two pages into my Google search. Hopefully, the point has been made. [The Cat Site]

Note to Pedigree: Plastic is Not Part of the Food Pyramid
A voluntary recall was issued by Pedigree for a limited range of three varieties of their weight management canned dog food due to the discovery of pieces of blue plastic in the varieties cited. While we’re not applauding Pedigree, we feel it’s important for animal product manufacturers to receive some level of merit for having the willingness to acknowledge a problem, with seemingly little or no pressure from a government agency, rather than attempting to sweep the problem under the rug. Consumers can and should return the product for a full refund. [Life with Dogs]

For great information on manufactured pet food, please remember to check out Poisoned Pets. [PoisonedPets.com]

Tainted Chicken Jerky Treats from China and Product Liability
The Washington DC Injury Lawyer Blog offers some information on product liability and pet supplies, pointing out it’s challenging to determine damages after a family loses their animal companion to a faulty pet product, since the law currently views animals as “personal property”. Damages are based on the animal’s fair market value and that is sad, to say the least. [Washington DC Injury Lawyer Blog]

Lennox’s Family Will Not Continue Legal Action
The family of Lennox the dog released a statement saying they have chosen not to prolong Lennox’s suffering fighting a battle they cannot win. This is a sad, yet understandable, course of action and all of us at Broken Hartz thank the family for the attention they brought world-wide to Breed Specific Legislation so it may inspire change. [Examiner]

Website Shocked to Discover People Will Not Pay for Free Information
On a side note, the North Country Gazette has dedicated a lot of time to covering the story of Lennox. Broken Hartz, along with other organizations and tens of thousands of Lennox supporters, had been thankful for this service, but the editor is seemingly pissed off that their plan to draw more attention to this story succeeded, dubbing loyal, repeat visitors to their website as being nothing more than common thieves. Here’s why:

The “paper” is, apparently, a pay service with no pay wall wherein the “company” has chosen to employ a hysterical combination of the honor system, mixed with passive-aggressive threats (less passive, more aggressive) to extract “donations” to their organization. They even go so far as to blame the “abuse” of Lennox supporters for threatening the website’s livelihood. The editor launches into a tirade, claiming Google to be anti-Lennox due to NCG’s AdSense account being disabled seemingly as a result of the website receiving an overwhelming amount of traffic from Facebook. We guess NCG hasn’t figured out how to capitalize on their recent spike in traffic without Google’s AdSense service.

We cannot stop laughing at how bizarre this is and wish we had looked into this more when we first recognized their red, mid-article donation demands. The following article points to a case where North Country Gazette was up-in-arms with another website for sharing an article that turned out to have been “borrowed” from a Florida news organization by NCG. [PI Bill Warner]

Tanks to teh BH Warriors fur sending us tips and info. Do you haz news fur me? Meow at me on Twitter @bhpenny or email pennysfinds@gmail.com.

Behind Closed Doors

We wish to expand on our discussion from Thursday’s posting.

While Hartz was busy lying to someone on Facebook, another conversation was taking place, hidden from view.

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A few weeks ago we were contacted by a Hartz victim in Canada who had applied Hartz Ultraguard One Spot Treatment for Cats and Kittens on two cats. Both of these cats reacted to the product with neurological issues. Chewie, sadly, did not survive:

“We euthanized him after a 20 minute grand mal seizure. We couldn’t even hold him in the room. My boyfriend and I had to go to Chewie in the lab while one girl held him down. The vet said ‘touch his head, tell him you love him, and let’s do this quickly’. It was the worst thing I’ve ever witnessed an animal go through.” – Hartz Victim

Hartz may wish to deny this video, pointing out the public has no way of knowing what product or brand was used, if any, or if the individual that contacted us was just making the whole thing up for no other reason than to try and pin another death on poor old Hartz.

While it’s true we have not met this individual face-to-face, those familiar with our blog should be aware we know our way around the internet and are not in the habit of accepting claims at face value. Immediately upon contacts of this nature, our team of investigators search for corroborating evidence.

Through research, we discovered:

• The name given checks out as a real name of a person living in the specific city in Canada this individual claims as their residence.
• Through IP address confirmation, this individual reached out to us from the specific city in Canada in which they claim to reside.
• Unknown to the individual, they confirmed personal, anecdotal information we had already discovered about the individual this person claims to be.

Additionally, this individual, aside from the video, has provided:

• Photos of the Hartz Ultraguard One Spot Treatment for Cats and Kittens package, claimed by this individual to be the culprit. This demonstrates the correct species product was used:
  
• The correct Health Canada number (26491) for the Hartz product claimed to be the culprit (This product matches up with US product EPA #2596-147, used by our affiliates)
• A phone number where this individual can be reached
• The case number Hartz assigned to this complaint after the victim contacted them
• Photos of Veterinarian notes on the case of Chewie:
  

  

Additionally, this individual has used their actual name through all correspondences with both us and Hartz. They would have gone to great lengths in order to stage what they claim has occurred and, in our opinion, their story more than sufficiently checks out. By the end of this post, we think you’ll agree.

As we’ve already mentioned, this individual contacted Hartz:

“The first thing the Hartz guy said was ‘I’d hate to think there was some sort of cross contamination or worse, if the wrong product was in the wrong packaging’. I thought that was a pretty random thing to say…” – Hartz Victim

Of course, that statement isn’t so random if you know Hartz has had packaging mix-ups in the past for Hartz Ultraguard One Spot Treatment for Cats and Kittens.

In the following screenshot, you’ll see the individual in question reiterated what Hartz said on the phone to the Company’s Facebook account. The Hartz Facebook team made no attempt to dispute that claim:

You’ll notice in this particular screenshot, at the beginning of corresponding with Hartz, the victim had hopes this would get resolved appropriately, though doubts were already forming. Regarding this conversation, the victim says:

“At this time I was still very upset and did not want to fight, I wanted answers. As you can see, I didn’t get one.” – Hartz Victim

Moving on, you’ll notice in the Veterinarian’s notes above, they assert an opinion that Chewie suffered from what appears to be Permethrin poisoning. There is not supposed to be any Permethrin in Hartz Ultraguard One Spot Treatment for Cats and Kittens (2.9% Methoprene), though it is found in Hartz Ultraguard One Spot Treatment for Dogs and Puppies (2.9% Methoprene, 45% Permethrin).

You’ll also note, in the screenshots above, a toxicologist was consulted who supports the Veterinarian’s opinion concerning this case. It resembles Permethrin poisoning (or some other toxic exposure) despite there being no indication on the packaging of Permethrin’s presence or anything other than Methoprene, an Insect Growth Regulator, widely accepted to be safe.

Because of this, the toxicologist inquired if there was a dog in the house that may have been treated with a Permethrin product or some other toxic substance. The veterinarian consulted with the Hartz victim, then noted:

“Called [Hartz Victim]. Discussed info from toxicologist. Confirmed dog in house, however, he was treated with Revolution (Selamectin)”

Revolution is an FDA-Approved Animal Drug, for use on both cats and dogs. As the Veterinarian notes, Revolution contains Selamectin, which kills fleas and flea eggs, along with treating for mites and a variety of worms. It does not match the profile of a possible culprit in this case.

The Veterinarian and toxicologist’s findings followed in line with the Hartz representative’s readily-offered suspicion that perhaps Permethrin was mistakenly placed into Hartz’ cat packaging, causing the death of Chewie.

This prompted the individual in question to post these notes from their Veterinarian on Hartz’ Facebook wall:

After posting this information on Hartz’ Facebook wall, the individual in question reached out to us.

Here is where this already interesting case takes an even more interesting spin.

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“Vet AND Toxicologist agree. The symptoms, timing of onset, even reputation of this product and brand – the only conclusion is that Hartz killed my cat The lab tech even said ‘we see this all the time’” – Hartz Victim

“This picture lasted exactly 7 minutes on the Hartz fb page before someone deleted it” – Hartz Victim

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This was followed up privately shortly thereafter with the following revelation:

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“I went back and it’s there!! People even slammed them in the comments… so weird. So I posted it, it was removed… then re-appeared?

I asked them in a public forem for a written apology [:)]

*forum

Can you see it from your page?” – Hartz Victim

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No, we could not see it from our page, nor could we see it using various control methods.

Clearly, there was a discrepancy.

Here is a portion of what the Hartz Victim (represented in black) was seeing:

Here is what we were able to see:

So, it became apparent we were witnessing a different Hartz tactic. This tactic is a bit more advanced than Hartz’ typical course of action: deletion.

The flaw in this plan is people really don’t take kindly to a product that causes them to inadvertently sicken, injure or kill those they love.

These kinds of people have a habit of finding each other and uniting. Through that, there were individuals watching this case unfold from both sides of the privacy setting, exposing Hartz’ intent to lure this victim into thinking this comment had been left in the public domain when it had, in fact, been hidden.

Unfortunately for Hartz, this individual (represented in black) was on to them.

In the screenshot above, the victim states:

“Isn’t this form a good DM as it is only visable [sic] to some people?” – Hartz Victim

“time dated screen shots from another computer show this is not a public message.” – Hartz Victim

To this, a Hartz Facebook “prisoner”, probably long forgotten, made themselves known:

“[Hartz Victim], Hartz removed this picture from their page, so it’s no longer visible to the public. Basically, they don’t want others to know about how dangerous their products are so they can keep making a profit. Sad.” – [Name Removed]

So, we come back to Hartz claiming other sites are guilty of misleading the public while, at the same time, they hid Veterinary documents pointing to the very serious possibility of a deadly packaging error.

The likelihood something of this nature would be limited to one package is highly unlikely and we hope Hartz is taking a close look at what is happening with Health Canada product #26491, though we are not holding our breath.

The individual in question makes one last point on this posting, regarding Hartz’ request for contact information:

“Hartz has all my info and has been able to ‘reach out’ to me at any time.” – Hartz Victim

It has been days now since the individual in question called Hartz out on their Facebook grouping tactic, with no response:

“I believe I am just being ignored.” – Hartz Victim

In the meantime, we checked back on the posting that led to Thursday’s piece.

We notice Hartz has removed a comment since the time of our last entry. We have accented the comment in question in the following screenshot from June 27, 2012:

Here is a susbsequent screenshot, taken on June 30, 2012, showing Hartz’ decision to remove the comment, which had received 5 “likes”:

“Don’t use Hartz. It’s terrible for your pets” – [Name Removed]

Upon closer inspection, we noticed this posting consists of 7 comments, even though a Facebook glitch notes 10 comments in the preview of this posting:

It would appear Hartz has removed 2 other comments before we got any screenshots of this posting.

We wonder what else they chose to censor.

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Partnership For a Hartz-Free America

The following video re-purposes the well-known “This is Your Brain on Drugs” Public Service Announcement, broadcast on American television during the late 1980s.

Given the manner in which the cat in the second half of this video is reacting, we at Broken Hartz feel the frying egg symbolism draws an appropriate parallel to what this poor animal experienced.

This cat’s brain is frying.

 

 

Please like this video on YouTube and share it wherever possible.

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We Prefer the Term “Homage”

For legal purposes, Broken Hartz wishes to state the following video is a parody, though you probably would have gathered that.

Enjoy!

For legal purposes, Broken Hartz wishes to state the preceding video was a parody, though you probably gathered that.

We hope you enjoyed!

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Another Cat Dies After Being Treated With Hartz Flea Drops

There are far too many terrible stories from pet owners who have lost their beloved animal friends, but this recent post from HartzVictims.org breaks our hearts; the victim’s sorrow is so painfully clear.

“Just had to put my cat to sleep yesterday, because she had kidney failure due to the Hartz flea drops. She was only 5 years old. She was an indoor cat so she hadn’t gotten into anything else. I only used it once and she had a seizure.I thought I would have Elly at least 15 or more years as great of care I took of her. She was my little girl. We were so close.”

These poisonous flea products aren’t only affecting the animals who suffer and die from them, but the loving pet owners who are left with the guilt of unknowingly causing harm to their dear friends.