Pet's poor health led to heartache

Pets Poor Health Leads to Heartache By Sharon L. Peters, Special for USA TODAY
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2007-10-31-puppy-mills-side_N.htm

This is story about a woman who bought a dog from a "Pet Store", The puppy was a small puppy and she bought the dog after she argued about the price. She took the dog home and enjoyed a flawless relationship with him for the next two months.

Unexpectedly the dog became ill and following a short period where the vets loaded her up with an enormous bill for treatment, the dog was put to sleep. She the owner is sad and the vets said there was nothing they could do. (But not until after they emptied her bank account) "This is where the story should go... but this is where it took the unsuspecting reader.

The bereaved woman returned to the pet store, note there is no mention of a health guarantee or if there were what time frames would be a reasonable time to detect any health abnormality. (Industry Standards range from 48 hours to 72 hours for the new owner to have the new dog inspected by a qualified vet to identify any health issues that may be present. This lady failed to mention if she had or had not had the dog inspected for fitness.

The owner demanded to have the name of the breeder and the Pet Store owner lacking in good business conduct or willingness to stand behind their product deferred the hapless owner to the breeder, where as she descended upon the property and basing her opinion on her emotions she made critical comments about the breeders property.
Remember the owner is a unhappy customer of the "Pet Store" and she for some reason thinks she has the right to intrude on this persons property and blame all of her problems on the breeder.

But because we feel sorry for the lady and of course the puppy it is easy for us to load up our anger and pity against the breeder, The Pet Store owner lacking in any character whatsoever threw her supplier to the wolves, and claimed to has terminated the relationship! For what reason?

Here's the Truth in this story..
1. The lady bought a dog .. and for some reason she felt there was something wrong with the puppy and argued over the price. The Pet store sold her the dog at a deep discount. "No Mentions of any Health Guarantee" After two months the dog became ill... well beyond any normal health guarantee if provided. Later it was determined the dog had to destroyed due to kidney failure, but no reason was documented as to what caused the failure.

Kidney failure in dogs can be brought on by several things, as noted after the fact by the Pet Store, Poi sen, Anti Freeze and in today's dog food climate even the dog food we buy at the store can be tainted. Just today we received notice the dog toothpaste can cause kidney failure if it came from China.

And the story continues:
She wrote to local and federal authorities. Those who responded said that because the breeder isn't licensed, they have no authority over her.

This is not true, the USDA APHIS division has jurisdiction over all breeders who sell puppies into the commercial stream. The USDA does have control over both the breeder licensed or not as well as the Pet Store. If the owner had in fact spoke to the USDA they would have taken a report and have conducted an investigation as mandated by Congress.

Says Johnson: "I'm not finished with this yet."

While we all agree the story is indeed a sad one we must all understand just as with our own lives there are no guarantees. We as Americans have become spoiled and have un realistic expectations as to how things can and do happen in the world. Lady this is life, you may have been heart broken by the loss of the puppy but you may have been the cause of its demise yourself. You may have gone to an inexperienced vet who was not interested in anything other than cleaning out your pocketbook. But you have failed to document any finding of fact, other than you have lost your puppy and have a broken heart.

The Reporter has done the public a great dis-service in reporting a story while heartfelt it was not based on fact and good journalism practice, The reporter failed to identify what the real issue was and missed several opportunities to expose, poor business practices and corruption , at least in two levels of this transaction.

The breeder is so far removed from this, he or she could not possibly have any responsibility in as far as this transaction is concerned. The reporter choose to slander the breeder by innuendo and all breeders have suffered as a result.

Sad Story but Really Bad Reporting