AGRICULTURE, DIET, & HEALTH
From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 1995:
Polls of children and teens done by
the National Live Stock & Meat Board’s
“Youth Initiative Task Force” found in 1992
and 1993 that 50% were concerned about the
fat and cholesterol in beef, 37% were con-
cerned about the fat and cholesterol in pork,
and 16% were concerned about the fat and
cholesterol in chicken––but only 4% saw cru-
elty in beef production, 3% saw cruelty in
pork production, and 2% saw cruelty in poul-
try production. Just 1% saw ecological harm
in eating beef; none saw ecological harm in
eating pork and poultry. A follow-up survey
is scheduled for this year.
“At present,” says Campaign for
Non-Violent Food coordinator Henry Spira,
“25 states exclude ‘accepted farming prac-
tices’ from the reach of cruelty laws.
Nineteen states amended their statutes to pro-
vide such exemptions in the past 12 years.
Eleven of these amended their statutes in the
last six years, and two states did so within the
past year. The result is that any ‘accepted
farming practice’ is legally permitted, no mat-
ter how cruel. Obviously there would be no
need to amend state cruelty laws were there
not the fear that accepted practices would be
judged cruel.” Spira’s remarks appear in the
first installment of a column he is now writing
for the Animal Welfare Institute newsletter.
Five southern California counties
on March 7 reported rises of egg-carried sal-
monella infections ranging from 17% to 117%
since 1989.
Protests over the export of live-
stock from Britain to the European continent
in the absence of humane transport standards
continue, as do air shipments by Phoenix
Aviation because vigils have closed all cattle
shipping ports. After suspected Animal
Liberation Front members trashed Phoenix
Aviation owner Chris Barrett-Jolly’s home in
retaliation for the February 1 death of protester
Jill Phipps, of Coventry, who was crushed by
a cattle truck (see March edition for details),
goon squads similarly trashed ALF spokesper-
son John Curtin’s home in Liverpool and also
attacked two activists’ homes in Manchester.
A 19-year-old woman, the only activist found
at home, reportedly suffered two fractured
ribs and facial bruises in one attack, which the
goons described as a response to a hunt sabo-
tage. Germany on March 6 unilaterally moved
to limit the transport time for slaughter-des-
tined animals to eight hours. The European
Union was to try again to reach a uniform
standard for animal transport in late March.
USDA food safety chief Michael
Taylor warned the Western States Meat
Association annual convention in San
Francisco on February 15 that the E. coli
0157:H7 bacterium is an “emerging
pathogen,” the control of which is little under-
stood. “We do not know how broad its eco-
logical niche will become,” Taylor said.
More than 4,000 Americans die each year and
another five million become ill due to contam-
inated meat, according to USDA statistics.
Research done by the State
University of New York at Stony Brook
and Oregon Health Sciences University has
found that people who lower their intake of
animal fat and increase consumption of whole
grains and pasta are significantly less hostile
and depressed, according to the current edi-
tion of the Annals of Internal Medicine.
Researchers from the Bowman
Gray School of Medicine in Winston-
Salem, North Carolina, told the American
Heart Association annual meeting on March
10 that hormones derived from soybeans
show promise as a potentially safer substitute
for pharmaceutical estrogens now used in hor-
mone replacement therapy––including
Premarin, the production of which involves
breeding more than 75,000 colts per year
whose only significant market is slaughter.
When the Czech Republic quit
subsidizing meat and dairy products i n
1991, the March 20 edition of N e w s w e e k
reported, prices soared, consumption fell,
markets for fruit, vegetables, and tofu devel-
oped, and heart disease rates in men dropped
13%; 9% in women.
Distributing coupons redeemable
for a free Vegan Burger for 10 days in
advance, the Berkeley group Vegan Action
planned to give away “a ton of free vegan
food” on March 21 at Sather Gate on the
University of California at Berkeley campus.
