Meet Your Meat, Why You Should Become Vegetarian
Meet Your Meat, Why You Should Become Vegetarian
When many Americans think of farm animals, they picture cattle munching
grass on rolling pastures, chickens pecking on the ground outside of
picturesque red barns, and pigs gobbling down food at the trough.
Over the last 50 years, the way food animals are raised and fed has changed
dramatically—to the detriment of both animals and humans. Many people are
surprised to find that most of the food animals in the United States are no
longer raised on farms at all. Instead they come from crowded animal
factories, also known as large confined animal feeding operations (CAFOs).
Just like other factories, animal factories are constantly searching for
ways to shave their costs. To save money, they've redefined what constitutes
animal feed, with little consideration of what is best for the animals or
for human health. As a result, many of the ingredients used in feed these
days are not the kind of food the animals are designed by nature to eat.
Just take a look at what's being fed to the animals you eat.
Same Species Meat
Diseased Animals
Feathers, Hair, Skin, Hooves, and Blood
Manure and Other Animal Waste
Plastics
Drugs and Chemicals
Unhealthy Amounts of Grains
Are these ingredients legal? Unfortunately, yes. Nevertheless, some raise
human health concerns. Others just indicate the low standards for animal
feeds. But all are symptoms of a system that has lost sight of the
appropriate way to raise food animals.
Same Species Meat, Diseased Animals, and Feathers, Hair, Skin, and Blood
The advent of "mad cow" disease (also known as bovine spongiform
encephalopathy or BSE) raised international concern about the safety of
feeding rendered[1]
cattle to cattle. Since the discovery of mad cow disease in the United
States, the federal government has taken some action to restrict the parts
of cattle that can be fed back to cattle.
However, most animals are still allowed to eat meat from their own species.
Pig carcasses can be rendered and fed back to pigs, chicken carcasses can be
rendered and fed back to chickens, and turkey carcasses can be rendered and
fed back to turkeys. Even cattle can still be fed cow blood and some other
cow parts.
Under current law, pigs, chickens, and turkeys that have been fed rendered
cattle can be rendered and fed back to cattle—a loophole that may allow mad
cow agents to infect healthy cattle.
Animal feed legally can contain rendered road kill, dead horses, and
euthanized cats and dogs.
Rendered feathers, hair, skin, hooves, blood, and intestines can also be
found in feed, often under catch-all categories like "animal protein
products."
Manure and Other Animal Waste
Feed for any food animal can contain cattle manure, swine waste, and poultry
litter. This waste may contain drugs such as antibiotics and hormones that
have passed unchanged through the animals' bodies.
The poultry litter that is fed to cattle contains rendered cattle parts in
the form of digested poultry feed and spilled poultry feed. This is another
loophole that may allow mad cow agents to infect healthy cattle.
Animal waste used for feed is also allowed to contain dirt, rocks, sand,
wood, and other such contaminants.
Plastics
Many animals need roughage to move food through their digestive systems. But
instead of using plant-based roughage, animal factories often turn to
pellets made from plastics to compensate for the lack of natural fiber in
the factory feed.
Drugs and Chemicals
Animals raised in humane conditions with appropriate space and food rarely
require medical treatment. But animals at animal factories often receive
antibiotics to promote faster growth and to compensate for crowded,
stressful, and unsanitary living conditions. An estimated 13.5 million
pounds of antibiotics—the same classes of antibiotics used in human
medicine—are routinely added to animal feed or water. This routine,
non-therapeutic use of antibiotics speeds the development of
antibiotic-resistant bacteria, which can infect humans as well as animals.
Antibiotic resistance is a pressing public health problem that costs the
U.S. economy billions of dollars each year.
Some of the antimicrobials used to control parasites and promote growth in
poultry contain arsenic, a known human carcinogen. Arsenic can be found in
meat or can contaminate human water supplies through runoff from factory
farms.
Unhealthy Amounts of Grains
One last surprise. While grain may sound like a healthful food, the
excessive quantities fed to some animals are not. This is especially true
for cattle, which are natural grass eaters. Their digestive systems are not
designed to handle the large amounts of corn they receive at feedlots. As a
result of this corn-rich diet, feedlot cattle can suffer significant health
problems, including excessively acidic digestive systems and liver
abscesses. Grain-induced health problems, in turn, ramp up the need for
drugs.
Want to Change What Animals are Fed?
The rise in animal factories over the last 50 years has led to a system that
is out of control. Mad cow disease, increased liver abscesses, and the rise
of antibiotic-resistant bacteria are just some examples of the damage that
comes from unwise and often inhumane approaches to raising food animals.
As a consumer armed with information, you have the power to promote a modern
approach to raising animals that is both productive and healthful. You can
help to effect change by supporting systems and producers that feed animals
the food they were meant to eat.
You can:
Avoid factory farmed animal products altogether by choosing plant-based
foods.
SOURCE ; of Concerned Scientists
National Headquarters
2 Brattle Square, Cambridge, MA 02238-9105
HOW HAS THIS AFFECTED HUMANS AND THEIR FAMILIES??
Over the past 30 years, we have made changes to our nations' food supply
that are greater than any other period in human history. We have moved our
country away from traditional food and into a world of factory farmed and
factory produced food that is not only harmful to our environment but is
killing Americans.
Today, there is very little food in our grocery stores that is real food and
that is healthy to eat. People now think that food comes in boxes with
hundreds of different ingredients. When eaten, these foods slowly poison
people until they develop heart disease, cancer, diabetes, kidney disease,
auto-immune system diseases, and many other serious diseases including
obesity. This poor quality food is creating enormous health care costs.
Across America is a sea of fast food and restaurant chains that are serving
the same meals in a thousand locations. How can they do this? They
accomplish this by creating cheap, prepackaged food that contains a toxic
mixture of sugar, chemicals and preservatives. The food is nutrient-poor and
the meat products are made from animals that have been raised inhumanely and
not sustainably. The food is then cooked in harmful disease causing fats
such as hydrogenated oil which is high heated and used over and over again.
Our government has allowed for this to happen to our society through
legislation. Our government allows for companies to continue to "create"
food using ingredients that are known to cause diseases so that this created
food can last for very long periods of time on shelves. Our government
allows for drugs to be used as artificial sweeteners in food and drinks. Our
government allows for harmful pesticides and chemical fertilizers to be used
in farming that poisons our environment, food and water supply. Our
government allows inhumane corporate farming practices that are the most
horrible practices that our nation has ever seen. Animals are being fed
unnatural diets consisting of animal waste by-products, saw dust and other
substances including toxic fungal infested grains that are not deemed safe
for humans. Animals have only been raised in these animal factory farms over
the last 25 years in order for food corporations to keep up with the demand
for animal meat to supply the fast food industry. Our government allows for
over 125,000 cattle to be crowded into one feedlot. Our government allows
for anabolic steroids to be placed into the ears of cattle to make them grow
bigger and faster. These steroids are linked to breast cancer, prostate
cancer and even early childhood development. Our government allows for
chickens to be bred in ways that creates species with breasts so large they
cannot stand up. Our government allows for animals to be raised in such poor
conditions that their immune systems are so weak that they cannot live
outside. Factory farming practices are the reason why we are seeing diseases
like swine flu and mad cow disease. In addition, these factory farms create
over 3 trillion pounds of waste manure each year. This is 10 times the
amount of waste produced by humans. These huge waste lagoons contaminate our
fresh food and water, and are a leading cause of global warming. And what
about the fish? 70% of our world's fish population has been over fished. Why
are endangered fish still being sold in restaurants and in markets? Why does
our government allow for all of these things to happen?
Food is an external substance that is taken in internally. Food affects
every cell in the human body. Food is necessary for people to live and for
their bodies to function and maintain good health. The quality of food and
nutrients people consume determines the physical and mental condition of
their body. All calories are not created equal and consuming unhealthy food
and animal products leads to unhealthy diseased people. We will never have a
healthy society if we continue to monetarily subsidize and support a food
industry that is disease causing.
It is no mystery why people are sick. I see clients every day who have long
lists of symptoms and illnesses who are often taking more than 20
medications at the same time to address their multiple symptoms – and this
too will kill them. At the root of their health problems is BAD FOOD AND
POOR DIETS. Sadly people have no idea that their diet is so unhealthy. The
food industry works very hard to prevent people from knowing the truth about
how their food is made and where it comes from. And because the food that
people are eating is also supported by both the United States Department of
Agriculture and the American Dietetic Association, people assume their food
is safe and healthy for them to eat.
Fake food has become the norm of our society. People, including young
developing children, are existing on already prepared and packed foods that
have been highly denatured, are nutrient-poor, and contain toxic
ingredients. These toxic foods have made their way into our school systems
and into our hospitals where they are fed to people who are sick and have
weakened immune systems.
We cannot continue as a society based on profit and greed. We must work
together to change this destructive path that we are on. The health and
welfare of our society, animals and the only planet that we have to live on
is at stake. Only when the truth about our food industry is exposed and
changes are made to our food policies can America’s epidemic of disease be
prevented.
Please write your congressional representatives and express the need for
better food and food polices in America.
SOURCE:Three Decades to a Sick Nation
By: Danielle Heard, MS, HHC
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