The 2025 warning letter was a contamination record, not a rumor
FDA's June 18, 2025 warning letter to Answers Pet Food says four sampled retail lots contained Salmonella, Listeria monocytogenes, or both. The same letter says investigators found Listeria on seven surfaces in the facility, including food-contact surfaces.
The warning letter documented contaminated lots and sanitation failures inside a raw-pet-food operation and named the findings in federal enforcement language.
The alerts kept coming after that
FDA's February 17, 2026 advisory says eight lots of RAAW Energy and related raw diets carried contamination concerns tied to Salmonella, Listeria monocytogenes, or both. FDA's September 3, 2025 notice also tied two lots of RAWR Raw Cat Food Chicken Eats to H5N1 contamination findings.
These are different products and different hazards, but they point in the same direction. The category keeps producing the kind of events that trigger public-health-style warnings, rapid product identification, and lot-specific cautions to consumers.
FDA's broader posture toward raw diets is already skeptical
FDA's raw-pet-food safety page says the agency tested 196 raw pet-food samples in its study and found contamination rates high enough to warn that raw diets can expose pets and people to pathogens.
The burden of proof sits with the companies selling the purity story, not with pet owners trying to reverse-engineer what went wrong after an illness, a recall notice, or a veterinary emergency.
The raw category has its own pathogen record
FDA's FY 2023 pesticide-residue monitoring report says 224 animal-food samples were tested and that the overwhelming majority of domestic and imported animal-food samples were compliant with federal pesticide regulations.
Raw diets keep surfacing in the pathogen events that force urgent federal notices. Broad market compliance does not erase the repeated pattern showing up in the raw niche.
Owners usually learn the hard way why lot codes matter
FDA's complaint guidance tells pet owners to preserve the original package, lot code, storage details, and veterinary records. That is because the public record only gets stronger when contaminated products can be traced to the exact lot and manufacturing window.
The complaint trail matters almost as much as the ingredient list. Traceability turns a scary anecdote into a product-specific record that regulators, veterinarians, and other owners can use.
Sources & records
Reviewed by Standards Review. Updated April 13, 2026.
- FDA Pesticide Residue Monitoring Report
Current FDA summary for pesticide-residue monitoring in human and animal food, including the FY 2023 animal-food sample set.
- FDA Warning Letter To Answers Pet Food
Detailed FDA warning letter describing pathogen findings, sanitation failures, and supply-chain problems in raw pet-food production.
- FDA Raw Pet Food Safety Page
FDA consumer page summarizing contamination findings from the agency's raw pet-food study and the risks raw diets can pose to pets and people.
- FDA RAAW Energy Advisory
Current FDA advisory for multiple contaminated lots of raw pet food sold for cats and dogs.
- FDA RAWR H5N1 Notice
Official FDA notice linking certain raw cat-food lots to H5N1 contamination findings.
- AAFCO Reading Labels
Current label guidance explaining that ingredients are listed by weight and that the ingredient list does not reveal absolute quantities.
- FDA How To Report A Pet Food Complaint
Official complaint-reporting guidance showing how FDA handles pet-food illness and product-problem reports and what evidence owners should preserve.
- FDA Diet And Canine DCM Q&A
Official FDA investigation page showing that diet-linked disease questions can be serious while still remaining unresolved and under review.
