21 U.S.C. § 2102 — Ensuring the safety of pet food

(a) Within 2 years of September 27, 2007, the Secretary of Health and Human Services must issue rules on pet food. The Secretary must talk with the Association of American Feed Control Officials and other groups, including animal-doctor groups and pet food makers. Those rules must set steps for making pet food. They must also update how pet food is labeled, adding food and ingredient facts. (b) Within 1 year of September 27, 2007, the Secretary must set up a system to catch problems early. This system must find tainted pet food and sickness linked to it. In building this system, the Secretary must do several things. The Secretary must look at tools already used to track human and animal health. Examples include the Foodborne Diseases Active Surveillance Network, PulseNet, the Food Emergency Response Network, and the National Animal Health Laboratory Network. The Secretary must also talk with doctor groups and private animal hospitals. The Secretary must work with alert systems, such as the National Companion Animal Surveillance Program or the Health Alert Network. These systems help tell vets about any pet food recall. Lastly, the Secretary may use any other facts or steps that seem right.

The source credit indicates that this section was enacted as part of Public Law 110–85, title X, § 1002, on September 27, 2007, and published at 121 Stat. 963. It was subsequently amended once, by Public Law 115–234, title III, § 306(b), on August 14, 2018, at 132 Stat. 2441. Beyond these two entries, the record does not reflect further amendment activity. Public Law 110–85 is the Food and Drug Administration Amendments Act of 2007, a broad statute reauthorizing and expanding several FDA programs. The pet food safety provisions are generally understood to have been added in response to a widely publicized 2007 contamination crisis, in which pet food ingredients tainted with melamine were linked to illness and death in cats and dogs across the United States. That episode is commonly cited as having exposed gaps in ingredient sourcing oversight, labeling standards, and the government's ability to detect and respond quickly to contamination in the pet food supply chain. Against that backdrop, provisions directing the Secretary of Health and Human Services to establish processing and labeling standards, and to create an early warning surveillance system, are consistent with the commonly understood aim of improving detection of adulteration and coordination among regulatory and veterinary networks. The record does not, however, establish the specific legislative deliberations or rationale behind the precise mechanisms chosen in subsection (b), and no further inference should be drawn beyond this general historical association.