As often as we can, we ask you to take one small step for animals. It takes 30 seconds to read, a couple of minutes to do, and thousands of lives can be saved. Today, we’re asking you to take one small step for your own animals. The current recall of pet food has sickened 14 people, sent five to the hospital, and potentially hurt an untold number of animals. It includes Chicken Soup for the Pet Lover’s Soul, Kirkland (Costco), Country Value, Diamond, Diamond Naturals, Premium Edge, Professional, 4Health, Taste of the Wild, Natural Balance, Wellness, Canidae, Apex, Solid Gold, and also small animal food by Kaytee Forti-Diet. 

Neither the FDA nor the pet food companies involved are aggressively looking out for your pets. You have to do it yourself. We asked Christie Keith, a journalist, blogger, and communications consultant who was one of the main sources of coverage for the 2007 pet food recall, what quick things you can do to protect your family, including the furry and fuzzy ones:

1. Set up a Google alert for the phrase “pet food recall” and the name of the brand or brands you feed your pets. (Improve the results of the Google alert by enabling blog and news searches, not just web searches. Bloggers may report a problem with food that doesn’t pan out, but they are also the first ones to break legitimate pet food recall stories.)
2. Follow the FDA’s recall Twitter feed
3. Subscribe to the FDA’s email recall alert system
4. Track #petfoodrecall on Twitter

Christie blogs about pet food recalls, No Kill, and other pet-related issues at honestdog.com.