Most 35 million cattle are raised for
Most people don’t ponder about the journeytheir food takes. Some people might believe that the milk they drink came froma cow grazing on a grassy pasture with an idyllic life, or eggs from a chickenthat lives in a sanitary environment. The reality can be very different, infact quite shocking.
The food production process is unethical because it abusesand tortures farm animals, they are raised in unhealthy living conditions, andproduce and distribute unhealthy foods leading to health problems.In the article “The welfareof animals” by the Humane society of America, the author describes the crueltyanimals face in farms by stating “animals are viewed by industrializedagriculture as commodities and suffer myriad assaults to their physical,mental, and emotional well-being, typically denied the ability to engage intheir species-specific behavioral needs” (1).Each year in the United States, approximately11 billion animals are raised and killed for meat, eggs, and milk. 86% arebirds—98% of land animals in agriculture, majority of those animals arechickens that are raised only for consumption. About 1 million killed each hourand 340 million hens are raised in the industry.
Everyyear in the United States, approximately 35 million cattle are raised for beefand more than 116 million pigs get slaughtered for their meat.Poultryare confined in their grower houses by the thousand and spend most of theirdays in a poorly lit room with little to no space to move. They live and die inenclosed spaces with terrible living conditions and genetic modifications toincrease growth and size. In the beginning, naturally some poultry do not havethe qualities of size that we see when we eat them. To get around this problem,major breeders rely on artificial breeding, which often takes place at separateartificial insemination facilities. After 2 or 3 days of a hen laying her eggs,the same process occurs multiple times for about 25 weeks.
Right when the eggsare laid, they are shipped to a hatching facility. At the hatchery, thousandsof eggs are put in large incubators, set for high speeds with bright lights andoptimal heat and humidity, the eggs hatch in less than a month. Oncethe hatchlings leave their shells, their life has only begun through theindustrial process. Chicks are exposed to high-intensity light and partiallymicrowaved to prepare for a routine surgery to have their beaks and talonsremoved. This prevents them from fighting one another in their tight livingspace. They are stuck in one space, unable to move because of the amount offood they are being forced to eat is making them fat, meaning less space. Oncethe chicks reach optimal size they are sent to the slaughter house, where theyare hung on a conveyer belt to be killed. Cattle are equally abused, in thearticle “cows used for food” by PETA, the author states, “When still very young, many cows are branded(burned with hot irons), dehorned (their horns are gouged out or cut or burnedoff), and castrated (male cattle have their testicles ripped out of theirscrotums)—all without painkillers.
Once they have grown large enough, cowsraised for beef are sent to massive, filthy outdoor feedlots, where they arefattened for slaughter. Cows on dairy farms are repeatedly artificiallyimpregnated (to keep their milk flowing) and then traumatically separated fromtheir newborn calves until finally their bodies wear out and they are sent tobe killed, too.” (1) These animals are highly intelligentand understanding, therefore they feel pain and discomfort from the foodproduction process. Their entire lives are spent being tortured just to beslaughtered.Theconditions that farm animals face are more than brutal and unsanitary. In thearticle “The Omnivore’s Delusion: Against the Agri-intellectuals” by Blake Hurst,the author describes the living conditions of farm animals by saying “I warnedyou that farming is still dirty and bloody, and I wasn’t kidding” (7). Theauthor shows that he was not speaking figurately, but literally. Animals areforced to sit on their own waste due to the space and contract diseases andbacteria that eventually spreads to the different animals.
The areas are rarelycleaned and only causes more health problems.Inthe article “factory farming and human health” by farm sanctuary, the authorreinforces unsanitary practices by stating “Sincethe 1950s, antibiotics have been used on factory farms to increase the rate ofgrowth in animals. Today, an estimated 70 percent of the antibiotics used inthe U.S. are given to farm animals for non-therapeutic purposes.
Usingantibiotics in this way can lead to drug-resistant bacteria; as a result,certain bacterial infections have already become or are on their way tobecoming untreatable in humans. Antibiotic resistant infections kill 90,000Americans every year. Poor sanitation and waste management on factory farms andthe poor management of animal waste can lead to the contamination of the foodsupply by bacteria like E. coli and salmonella. Each year 76 million Americansbecome ill from food borne illness, and thousands die.
Some diseases, like H1N1(Swine Flu) and Avian Flu, are communicable from animals to humans. These”zoonotic” diseases have the potential to become pandemics. Experts believethat the outbreak of H1N1 was likely caused by the overcrowding of pigs onfactory farms and the storage of their waste in giant manure lagoons” (1). Thisshows the issues with hygiene in facilities, resulting in issues for thelivestock.Theissue with gruesome farming practices don’t only affect the livestock but thepeople eating it as well.
The food production industry leads to inadequatequality foods for people and results in negative health effects, leading to lowquality life. In “Michael pollen” by Bill Moyers, the author explains the foodcrisis by saying “And if you do hope to make progress in allthese other areas, you must make sure that if the Surgeon General is, you know,going on about the epidemic of type 2 diabetes, you don’t want to be signingfarm bills that subsidize high fructose corn syrup at the same time. So, youhave to kind of align. A day. A day. We’ve gone from 2,000 or 2,300 to 2,600,something like that. We all weigh on average ten pounds more. And lo andbehold, we have a serious epidemic of obesity, type 2 diabetes, heart disease,diet-related cancers.
All these chronic diseases which is now what kills usbasically reliably in America are adding more than $250 billion a year tohealthcare costs. They are the reason that this generation just being born nowis expected to have a shorter lifespan than their parents, that one in threeAmericans born in the year 2000, according to the Centers for Disease Control,will have type 2 diabetes, which is a serious sentence. It takes several yearsoff your life. It gives you an 80 percent chance of heart disease. It means youare going to be spending $14,000 a year in added health costs. So, this isabout how we’re eating”.
(5)Foodindustries focus on certain products that are used in many fast food placeslike corn, oils, etc. farms and food industries make more money the unhealthieryou get. In the article “too much of too little” by Eli Saslow the authorstates “insteadof trying to regulate the estimated $2 billion in junk-food purchases enabledeach year by food stamps, he wrote a bill to ban the food-stamp purchase ofonly one product. That was energy drinks — high in caffeine and higher insugar, expensive and marketed to children despite offering little nutritionalvalue. “A no-brainer,” he explained as he introduced the bill in a committeemeeting last summer. Then he yielded the microphone and waited for rebuttals.The first critic was one he had anticipated, a lobbyist for the Texas BeverageAssociation, which desperately wanted all its drinks available for sale to thefastest-growing market in America: the food-stamp market, which has quadrupledfrom $20 billion to $80 billion in the past 12 years.
Companies such asCoca-Cola, Kraft and Mars have spent more than $10 million in the past severalyears lobbying Congress to keep their products available to those using foodstamps. “No clear standards exist for defining foods as good or bad,” thelobbyist said” (3). This shows that because of theoriginal unhealthy actions of the food industry, they make buying foods, highin fats and oils cheap and accessible. Leaving the healthier foods harder tobuy, so people that are not finically stable spend their food stamps on cheaperfoods that end up being their demise and causing health problems like highcholesterol and diabetes. The food industry that create unhealthy foods, createa problem for some people because they get trapped in a dilemma where the onlyfood they can get are low in nutrition and cause major problems regardinghealth. In the article “How industrial foods impact your health” by the gracecommunications foundation, the author says “Americans spend about ninety percent of theirfood budget on processed foods, which, unlike whole foods, have been treated insome way after being harvested or butchered. Almost these processed foodscontain additives, substances intended to change the food in some way before itis sold to consumers. Bacteria are everywhere, including on the skin and in thedigestive system of humans.
While bacteria are critical to normal bodilyfunctions, some types can cause illness. In humans, antibiotics are used totreat health conditions caused by bacteria, including ear and skin infections,food poisoning, pneumonia, meningitis and other serious illnesses. Antibioticsare also used to treat or prevent infections that can complicate criticalmedical procedures including surgery, cancer therapy, and transplants” (1) Foods are also genetically modifiedGenetically engineered to be able to transmit different traits from animals orplants to make a better product. The resulting organism is called transgenic ora GMO (genetically modified organism). 70% of processed foods in Americansupermarkets now contain genetically modified ingredients. 32.5 million cattlewere slaughtered to provide beef for US consumers. Cattle are injected withhormones to make them grow faster, meaning higher profits for the foodproduction companies.
Everydaythe food production process harms and abuses animals to make more product toimprove profits, using methods like poor spacing, brutal treatment and additiveslike steroids and antibiotics to keep their products in line. The result ofthese foods affects the health of people by giving them unsanitary andpoisonous produce. Making cheap and mal nutritious foods available, sabotagingmany Americans daily.
