This seems reckless to release names without a causal relationship defined. The only thing they seem to be able to determine is that in some breeds, some dog foods that are really common, might possibly be related to the disease. That's kind of like saying that because nearly every human eats vegetables on a regular basis, vegetables must cause cancer and heart disease since those are the two major causes of deaths in humans. I've had numerous dogs on one of the listed brands, not a single one has died of this disease.
This seems reckless to release names without a causal relationship defined.
One potential upside: It can foster additional research to try to pinpoint the critical information. Keeping the list secret impedes potential new research.
Certainly it's reasonable for people to put out disclaimers and warnings that this isn't really sufficient information to base decisions upon etc. But that's different from saying we shouldn't have the info at all and it's reckless to put it out there.
Unlike most people, dogs usually get fed majority of food from single sources. Thus causality is relatively strong in comparison to other observational studies.
It's not though. Establishing Brand X as a cause doesn't tell you what ingredient, or what missing nutrient, or what other feature of that brand's food is causing the problem. What value is there in that? You can switch brands, but you have no way to know the new food isn't worse than the old food. And if you're the producer, you have no knowledge of how to improve your food - might as well just close up shop because ... the brand is the cause?
