Autor: global-affair

In this vitriolic campaign season, it may seem like there’s more that divides Americans than unites us. But there is one issue that we should all readily agree on: We need to cut the pork.

I mean the kind that comes from pigs.

© iStock.com/Edoma

A pork-free platform appeals to the entire political spectrum. Blue-collar Americans should naturally hate pork production, as it exposes workers to neurological hazards and injuries from dangerous equipment—last year, the top four U.S. meat companies averaged a “serious” worker injury every two and a half days.

Middle America knows that it loses when the pig industry comes to town. Their property values plummet and noxious fumes from pig waste affect their ability to enjoy their own homes. Worse, studies have found that people who live near pig farms report more headaches and diarrhea than other communities and suffer from “significantly reduced lung function.”

Environmentalists can’t stand that a pound of pork requires more than double the amount of water to produce that a pound of soybeans requires. And since one pig produces as much fecal matter in a day as 10 humans, they cringe, knowing porcine excrement leaches into our water and soil.

Meanwhile, nationalists are outraged that many pigs are raised and slaughtered in this country just so that the flesh can then be shipped to China. That a Chinese company now owns America’s largest pork producer is no doubt considered an additional insult.

Doctors, nurses and nutritionists shudder at the thought that their patients might be consuming processed pork products: Just one hot dog or a few strips of bacon per day increases the risk of developing cancers of the lower stomach and colon by 18 percent, while women who eat just one strip of bacon per day may be increasing their risk of breast cancer by 42 percent.

Parents have heard pediatricians warn against giving unnecessary antibiotics to children and are disgusted that pig farmers around the world use nearly four times as much of these drugs as other animal farmers per pound of flesh produced. And it’s equally upsetting that the children of women who consume cured meats daily during pregnancy run a “substantial risk” of developing a pediatric brain tumor.

Retired Americans want nothing to do with the forecasted increase in pork prices, nor do they want to eat bacon, sausage and other pig-derived meat, given that these foods have been linked to plaque buildup in the brain, impaired cognitive function and Alzheimer’s.

Feminists are livid that sows are confined for their entire pregnancy to crates so small that they can’t even turn around. And it’s almost too much to bear that a mother’s piglets are taken away from her just days after birth, never to be seen again.

Animal behaviorists know that pigs form strong bonds with one another and are highly intelligent animals who can even play video games and use mirrors to find food. But they also know that farmed pigs are castrated without painkillers and shipped without water or protection from the elements to slaughterhouses all across the U.S., where they squeal in terror as they’re about to be killed.

Finally, millions of Americans can attest to the fact that any food made from animals—from sausage to smoky bacon—can also be made from plants and that these options are delicious and cholesterol-free.

So let’s rise above the political fray this election year: Cut the pork, and go vegan.

The post Opinion: This Election Season, Let’s Cut the Pork appeared first on PETA.

Nothing strikes fear in the heart like a little-known disease creeping toward the United States. News from South America that a virus called Zika could cause serious birth defects gave Americans good reason to worry: It’s estimated that nearly 300 million people in North and South America live in areas where the virus is likely to spread. One result will be babies born with microcephaly, a condition in which the brain does not develop properly. How many babies, no one knows.

The response from the research community and health officials was to seek funding to launch an enormous number of studies. While this is appropriate in some respects, a research program that throws grants at a variety of uncoordinated experiments will waste tax dollars, animal lives and precious time. We need a better national response to devastating illness.

On the plus side, the National Institutes of Health (NIH), private funding foundations and all major science journals signed a pledge to share all data from studies online at no cost, according to Donald G. McNeil Jr., author of Zika: The Emerging Epidemic. This is a step in the right direction.

But studies should add to the body of knowledge of medical treatments for humans. Studies on animals won’t do this. While it’s unethical to use animals as living test tubes, without regard for the value of their lives, it’s also bad science.

Animals rarely have the same diseases as humans, and even when they do, their bodies react differently from ours. Scientists have systematically reviewed animal experiments and have documented that data from other animals—including mice, rats, dogs, cats, rabbits, monkeys and even chimpanzees—simply do not apply to human beings. In its recently published strategic plan, NIH lamented that “animal models often fail to provide good ways to mimic disease or predict how drugs will work in humans, resulting in much wasted time and money while patients wait for therapies.”

Some species of monkeys do get Zika, but when pregnant monkeys in a laboratory at the University of Wisconsin–Madison were infected, the outcome didn’t mirror what happens to pregnant humans and their fetuses exposed to the virus. Pregnant monkeys infected with Zika during their first and third trimesters did not produce babies with microcephaly, yet human women appear to be affected at all stages of pregnancy. It’s not even clear whether monkey babies suffer any ill effects at all.

Even the imprisonment of monkeys for experimentation may have unintended and dangerous consequences. Thousands of monkeys are housed at several large-scale breeding and import facilities in Hendry County in southern Florida, including Primate Products, Inc., the Mannheimer Foundation and Bioculture, and these facilities can become reservoirs for Zika when monkeys there are bitten by mosquitoes carrying the virus.

PETA consulted Dr. Jan Hajek, an infectious disease specialist and clinical assistant professor at the University of British Columbia who has worked with the World Health Organization and Doctors Without Borders in combating outbreaks of Ebola, hepatitis E and multidrug-resistant tuberculosis, about these facilities and the best way to deal with the threat of the Zika virus. He responded:

In combating Zika, we urgently need research on better diagnostic tests for humans, on better means to control mosquitoes, and on monitoring and supporting people, particularly pregnant women, at risk for or already infected with Zika. Resources are finite and should be spent in a way that leads to the greatest benefit and the least harm. … Given the risk that these facilities pose to public health, the government and residents of Florida need to consider very carefully whether or not they should continue to support them in their communities.

It’s time to move away from the old scientific paradigm, in which experimenters cling to the wreckage of useless animal studies, ignoring what we do share with animals—such as the need for connection with others of our own kind, love for our babies, and the capacity for loneliness—and instead embrace humane research that will lead to effective prevention and cures.

Kathy Guillermo is senior vice president of laboratory investigations at PETA, 501 Front St., Norfolk, VA 23510; www.PETA.org.

The post Opinion: Zika Response Should Not Include Animal Experiments appeared first on PETA.