WARNING - poisonous Chews!

[Vallhala]

Copied from a rescue forum:

"BEWARE rawhide like chew called Exer-Hide - this has been causing MAJOR seizures and death. This product is manufactured in Brazil. This has been happening since December and yet the crap is still being sold. We have a client that gave one to 3 of her dogs - one died, one almost died and the third was very lucky..Please - pass this info on! Also available Asda"

Unconfirmed on Snopes and here, but worth using caution until we know more, certainly.

Unfortunately this story has been circulating around the net for ages. See http://www.hoax-slayer.com/exer-hide-warning.shtml here for a fuller description and analysis. In the absence of a warning from a reputable British source such as RCVS or BSAVA I'd tread carefully. Perhaps any vets on the forum can advise of any warnings/notes they've received? Also nothing on the Veterinary Poisons information Bureau.

I can't see any available in Asda either, but obviously I can't swear they won't be in store.

Now I feel a fool! Thank you for the info, both of you, I'll pass it on.

ScuttleButter, I maybe should have thought to check... the post (clearly posted on from another forum) was put up by a certain greyhound owning gentleman of both our aquaintance!

And you still fell for it!!!!! (Spits coffee on screen) Oh Val, now I'm going to be giggling all day tomorrow.

To be fair, we don't really know either way, but it does have the hallmarks of hysteria, given there is no real evidence. I will keep my ears open though.

For messages like this I always check on Snopes and Hoaxslayer. Hoaxslayer actually have a really handy checklist for identifying dodgy mass emails/postings as well. Has saved me from many weird and wonderful scares. Also it's helpful to look at the source of a story - if it's been forwarded by about twenty people all saying "please forward this to everyone you know" then it is almost certainly fake.

You bugger ScuttleButter! :o