 Aminopterin was widely described in news reports as a "rat poison", though that assertion may be based upon a hypothetical use listed in the 1951 patent application and not upon the actual use of the chemical.Aminopterin is illegal in China,
and neither Cornell University nor the FDA could replicate the New York lab's results.On 27 March, the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals reported the symptoms described in affected animals are not "fully consistent with the ingestion of rat poison containing aminopterin."