Purina Felix
As Good As It Looks (AGAIL)
Earlier this year, at the same time as the pancytopenia outbreak there was concern about ‘Purina Felix (AGAIL) voiced by cat and kitten owners which caused some confusion. Purina changed the formulation of their foods in the first quarter of this year and also moved production around to meet supply issues. Purely anecdotally, thousands of people made a connection between the change in formulation and their cats and kittens getting upset stomachs. As Purina have investigated and found no cause for the new formulations upsetting tummies we can only inform you our personal experience of this concern.
One of our foster carers had a mother cat who started to have the most disgusting smelling soft stools – far more smelly than any experienced before with mother cats. Being aware of a Facebook group saying there might be issues with Felix AGAIL, our foster carer immediately changed the cat onto other wet foods and within 3 days the cats stools were back to normal. In addition, one of our trustees experienced her own elderly cat suddenly getting an upset tummy and foul smelling pooh, switched him onto other foods and he immediately improved.
We are well aware that Purina have tested samples of foods, including those from our foster carer, and found no issues with them, however as caretakers of often unwell and weaker rescues we have decided not to supply Felix to our foster carers and are now using other brands.
We would like to stress that the issue with Felix is NOT linked to pancytopenia and absolutely no link has ever been found or suggested. However, as the anecdotal issues occurred at the same time as the outbreak, there was some confusion on social media at that time.
These two issues affected us as a charity and has made 2021 a challenging year.