Well, I think you know the answer to this one: unless we get better regulations we simply don't know. Ironically, the FDA has been cut back in funding every year for the last 6 years with the insistence 1. that the industry will police itself and 2. that consumers won't buy tainted things. Okay, the realities are A. that the consumers don't have the data to know what could be or is tainted, and B. that the same politicians who say that industries will police themselves are right now bring "unfair competition" charges against a small beef company which had been checking every steer it killed for bovine spongiform disease (Mad Cow). What did that small company do that is being called unfair? Well, it actually checked the animals instead of just checking the ones who collapsed and a few others who might be questionable. That is being called unfair by larger companies who want all to test only a very few of the animals. Okayyyyyy... Fun to be a consumer these days, isn't it? We're all in the same boat, people, and it's got more than a few leaks. So, the functional reality is that the cutbacks in funding for the FDA, the lack of information getting to the public (though the FDA recall site is helpful for what they do find despite cutbacks: http://www.fda.gov/opacom/7alerts.html ), and the attempts to attack companies that try to hold themselves to higher standards all indicate that it's likely that what is really going on is that mega- agriculture is getting the same degree of spoiling that some other companies such as the oil industry are widely recognized to be receiving. I think that these URLs may help with some of your other questions, but honestly, there are huge limits on what any of us regular folks can know of what is going on because the very governmental departments that try to protect us have been ham-strung in recent years. Professional consultation on balancing homemade diets with articles by Dr. Rebecca Remillard, Ph.D., D.V.M., DACVN: http://www.petdiets.com/ http://www.petdiets.com/Library/category.asp FDA raw pet foods guidance: http://www.fda.gov/cvm/Guidance/Guide122.pdf http://www.fda.gov/cvm/CVM_Updates/rawdiet.htm Increased meat digestibility from cooking (Just debunking a myth): http://exploratorium.edu/cooking/meat/INT-what-is-meat.html http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/tv_and_radio/fullonfood_meat.shtml http://forums.egullet.com/index.php?showtopic=40548 (BTW, I was pretty horrified to learn -- from his own CV -- that a prominent person claiming to be a veterinary doctor and nutrition expert who makes income from promoting a certain raw diet actually has a bachelors in vet med (something many people in the U.S. don't know exists in some other countries), and that he has no higher degrees in vet med and no degrees in nutrition at all. Now, I am not saying that people can't learn after school and even learn a great deal because hopefully we all do, but also hopefully we don't then try to be addressed as "doctor" which is a term that means that a doctorate has been earned.) Sukie (not a vet) Recommended ferret health links: http://pets.groups.yahoo.com/group/ferrethealth/ http://ferrethealth.org/archive/ http://www.afip.org/ferrets/index.html http://www.miamiferret.org/fhc/ http://www.ferretcongress.org/ http://www.trifl.org/index.shtml http://homepage.mac.com/sukie/sukiesferretlinks.html [Posted in FML 5626]