Bye bye MEAT! How will the post-meat future look?

[editor]

The disgusting meat industry is endangering us all

For decades, evidence had amassed that the widespread use of antibiotics to help chickens, pigs, and cattle grow faster — and survive the crowded conditions of factory farms — was causing bacteria to mutate and develop resistance to antibiotics. By 2009, US agriculture companies were buying up two-thirds of what are termed medically important antibiotics — those used in human medicine. This in turn has made those precious, lifesaving drugs less effective for people.

Over time, once easily treatable human infections, like sepsis, urinary tract infections, and tuberculosis, became harder or sometimes impossible to treat. A foundational component of modern medicine was starting to crumble. But it wasn’t until the mid-2010s that the FDA finally took the basic steps of requiring farmers to get veterinary prescriptions for antibiotics and banning the use of antibiotics to make animals grow faster — steps that some European regulators had taken a decade or more prior.

Thanks to those two actions alone, sales of medically important antibiotics for livestock plummeted 42 percent from 2015 to 2017. But according to Matthew Wellington of the Public Interest Research Group, the FDA’s reforms went after the low-hanging fruit, and they didn’t go nearly far enough. Now, in a concerning course reversal, antibiotic sales for use in livestock ticked back up 7 percent from 2017 to 2021, per a new FDA report. The chicken industry, which had led the pack in reducing antibiotic use on farms, bought 12 percent more antibiotics in 2021 than in 2020

It’s a sobering turn of events with life-and-death implications. In 2019, antibiotic-resistant bacteria directly killed over 1.2 million people, including 35,000 Americans, and more than 3 million others died from diseases where antibiotic resistance played a role — far more than the global toll of HIV/AIDS or malaria, leading the World Health Organization to call antibiotic resistance “one of the biggest threats to global health, food security, and development today.”

The pork sector, like poultry, is also vertically integrated, but the industry has largely opposed animal welfare, environmental, and antibiotic reforms. Antibiotics in pig production shot up 25 percent from 2017 to 2021.

There’s also no pork or beef giant that’s taken the antibiotic-free leap like Perdue did for chicken. That could change in the years ahead: McDonald’s, the world’s largest beef purchaser, announced at the end of 2022 that it plans to reduce antibiotic use in its beef supply chain. However, the announcement didn’t come with a timeline, which worries advocates like Wellington, and the company has failed to make good on other pledges.

Big Meat just can’t quit antibiotics

Meat production is making lifesaving drugs less effective. Where’s the FDA?

www.vox.com

 

[Jeff Robinson]

Yes they do. They're banging on about '3.5%', but every single example they use involves activists working to free themselves from oppression. It's bullshit dressed up as 'science'.

The video is a bit basic sure, they could do with producing better educational materials tbh. But learning lessons from successful past social justice movements doesn't mean assuming they are 'equivalent' (i.e. the same) to the animal rights movement. A number of leading voices from the civil rights movement - Angela Davis, Ceasre Chavez, Alice Walker - have made analogies themselves between the two movements, but analogies are not drawing equivalence. By definition an analogy means there were will be some similarities and some differences. That animals themselves cannot take direct part in the movement is an important difference for tactical and strategic purposes.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

The video is a bit basic sure, they could do with producing better educational materials tbh. But learning lessons from successful past social justice movements doesn't mean assuming they are 'equivalent' (i.e. the same) to the animal rights movement. A number of leading voices from the civil rights movement - Angela Davis, Ceasre Chavez, Alice Walker - have made analogies themselves between the two movements, but analogies are not drawing equivalence. By definition an analogy means there were will be some similarities and some differences. That animals themselves cannot take direct part in the movement is an important difference for tactical and strategic purposes.

Here's something a bit less basic - a series of responses to objections to animal rights by Steven Wise, director of the Nonhuman Rights Project and a leading advocate of animal rights. He repeatedly draws equivalence (not analogy) between human rights movements and animal rights. He explicitly makes the connection with civil rights (using some frankly ahistorical generalisations) several times.

This isn't mere analogy. It is equivalence.

Not long ago in Western law, only white people had rights., not blacks or indigenous peoples. Only men had rights, not women. Only adults had rights, not children. The claim that those lines needed to be redrawn, that blacks should have rights or women or children, sounded “odd or frightening or laughable” to many. Each claim was stoutly resisted for decades, sometimes centuries, by those blind to the true meaning of such fundamental values that we nearly all agree with as liberty and equality by their times. Today many, including Posner, Epstein, and Cupp, are similarly blind to the claim that a nonhuman can have any rights by their times. Our times. The irony is they argue that any new line must be shown to be decisive, oblivious that the ancient line that exists between humans and the rest of the universe was based upon outdated and disproven biology and superseded moral values that long ago rendered it arbitrary and unjust.

The Case AGAINST Animal Personhood

 

[ddraig]

Why so breathlessly determined to ridicule and do down activists?

 

[Funky_monks]

lol, why would I sign that piece of shit statement?

Oh good. You've admitted you've got fuck all clue then and are possibly (possibly) capable of reading a website.

 

[Funky_monks]

Why so breathlessly determined to ridicule and do down activists?

For the same reason I'd want to do down other religious extremist activists.

 

[Funky_monks]

Also, a load of weird shit about the yanks not having any antibiotic regs doesn't apply in places not the USA.

It's virtually impossible to get antibiotics that have human implications here. I had to really pressure my vet to get Baytril for my dog because of this, even though he had no chance of ending up in the food chain.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Yeah need to draw a distinction between the damage caused by bad farming, whether that is for meat or plants, and damage that is inherent to farming whatever methods are used.

I think there's pretty much universal agreement on this thread that bad farming urgently needs reforming. Not sure referring to 'the meat industry' as if it were a single global entity is helpful.

 

[editor]

Still plenty of antibiotics being used in the UK - a filthy industry endangering the health of all of us. And, of course, dangerous antibiotic resistance doesn't respect national boundaries, so it's ridiculously naïve to dismiss or discount their use elsewhere.

Worldwide it is estimated that 73% of all antibiotics are used in farm animals, not people. Much of this use is routine, and enables farm animals, most often pigs and poultry but sometimes also cattle, to be kept in poor conditions where disease spreads easily. Leading authorities such as the European Medicines Agency and the WHO say that the overuse of antibiotics in farming contributes to higher levels of antibiotic resistance in some human infections

In the UK, British livestock farmers have made good progress in reducing their antibiotic use, and farm antibiotic use now accounts for about 30% of all British antibiotic use. British pig and poultry farmers have reduced or, in some cases, ended routine use. This progress is welcome, however, much more needs to be done, as antibiotic use remains too high.

Alliance to Save our Antibiotics

Our campaign highlights the overuse of antibiotics in factory farming.

www.ciwf.org.uk

Antibiotic resistant bacteria has been found in UK rivers prompting calls on the UK government for an urgent ban on the routine use of antibiotics on healthy farm animals.

The new report Life-threatening superbugs: how factory farm pollution risks human health is the first of its kind in the UK and the results expose the far-reaching implications of factory farms on animal welfare, human health and our environment.

Antibiotic resistant bacteria were found in rivers and waterways in areas with high levels of factory farming. Two common bacteria that can cause infection and illness in humans and animals are E. coli and S. aureus; antibiotic-resistant Escherichia coli (E. coli) and Staphylococcus aureus (S. aureus) were isolated in rivers adjacent to both pig and chicken factory farms and higher-welfare outdoor farms, as well as in slurry runoff from intensive dairy farms. Antibiotic resistance genes were also found.

Samples were taken around factory farms in areas around the UK with high levels of farming including Sussex, Norfolk and the Wye Valley, which has made headlines recently due to the level of pollution from runoff from chicken farms causing high levels of nitrates and phosphorus and creating ecological dead zones.

Key findings:

· Resistance was found to the antibiotic cefotaxime in E. coli and vancomycin in S. aureus. Both of these antibiotics are classified by the World Health Organization as highest-priority critically important antimicrobials in human medicine. Resistance was also found to ampicillin, cefazoline and trimethoprim in some of the E. coli, and erythromycin and trimethoprim in some of the S. aureus. All these antibiotics are classified as highest-priority critically important, critically important or highly important in human medicine.

· Testing was also carried out for two antibiotic-resistance genes, Sul1 and Tet b. When bacteria acquire antibiotic-resistance genes, they may become antibiotic resistant. Sul 1, which confers resistance to sulphonamides, which are classified as highly important in human medicine, was found more consistently downstream than upstream of factory pig and chicken farms. This suggests resistance is entering the environment from these farms.

The UK farming industry has managed to reduce its antibiotic use by 55% since 2014, but far greater reductions are still needed. Unfortunately, the UK government has refused to ban preventative group treatments - as the EU has done - despite having previously promised to do so.

Antibiotic resistant bacteria found in rivers near UK factory farms | Sustain

Investigation by Alliance to Save our Antibiotics, World Animal Protection and the Bureau of Investigative Journalism highlights new consequences of antibiotic use on factory farms.

www.sustainweb.org

 

[ddraig]

Yeah need to draw a distinction between the damage caused by bad farming, whether that is for meat or plants, and damage that is inherent to farming whatever methods are used.

I think there's pretty much universal agreement on this thread that bad farming urgently needs reforming. Not sure referring to 'the meat industry' as if it were a single global entity is helpful.

If not blustering trying to state what everyone agrees with! Get over yourself ffs

e2a - not helpful to who? you and your feelings?

 

[ddraig]

For the same reason I'd want to do down other religious extremist activists.

Is LBJ your sockpuppet or are you theirs then?

 

[Spymaster]

I think there's pretty much universal agreement on this thread that bad farming urgently needs reforming.

Indeed. But it looks like the thread's IQ average just went through the floor.

 

[ddraig]

Eating chicken without killing chicken?

A US firm has regulatory approval for lab-grown meat and is aiming to sell it to restaurants soon.

www.bbc.co.uk

 

[friedaweed]

‘It feels like a sign’: joy at rise in cattle egrets on wildlife-friendly UK farms

Farmers who have taken regenerative approach hail birds as indication of ecosystem health

www.theguardian.com

More death and destruction due to changes in farming.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

If not blustering trying to state what everyone agrees with! Get over yourself ffs

e2a - not helpful to who? you and your feelings?

Not helpful to accuracy and meaningful debate.

Unlike you, I don't base everything I say here on my feelings. You're projecting.

 

[editor]

‘It feels like a sign’: joy at rise in cattle egrets on wildlife-friendly UK farms

Farmers who have taken regenerative approach hail birds as indication of ecosystem health

www.theguardian.com

More death and destruction due to changes in farming.

Yes, who cares about the threat of global warming, pollution, cruelty, mistreatment of animals and the terrifying impact of antibiotic resistance on humans when 25 egrets are gathering to feed on a farm in Plymouth?

It surely is a good news day!

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Yes, who cares about the threat of global warming, pollution, cruelty, mistreatment of animals and the terrifying impact of antibiotic resistance on humans when 25 egrets are gathering to feed on a farm in Plymouth?

It surely is a good news day!

Did you even read the article? You've been giving examples of bad farming. This is an example of much better farming, which isn't having those destructive effects.

But you're not interested in that debate, are you? Unless it involves ENDING ALL MEAT AND DAIRY, you're not interested in how to improve things.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Not helpful to accuracy and meaningful debate.

eg

Yes, who cares about the threat of global warming, pollution, cruelty, mistreatment of animals and the terrifying impact of antibiotic resistance on humans when 25 egrets are gathering to feed on a farm in Plymouth?

It surely is a good news day!

 

[friedaweed]

Did you even read the article? You've been giving examples of bad farming. This is an example of much better farming, which isn't having those destructive effects.

But you're not interested in that debate, are you? Unless it involves ENDING ALL MEAT AND DAIRY, you're not interested in how to improve things.

Clearly doesn't have a lot of love for the Egrets

 

[Funky_monks]

Is LBJ your sockpuppet or are you theirs then?

Yes, people conducting a discussion from different backgrounds who are in broad agreement must be part of some sort of shady conspiracy.

You've got the persecution complex down.

There but for the grace of veganism go you.

 

[Funky_monks]

Yeah need to draw a distinction between the damage caused by bad farming, whether that is for meat or plants, and damage that is inherent to farming whatever methods are used.

I think there's pretty much universal agreement on this thread that bad farming urgently needs reforming. Not sure referring to 'the meat industry' as if it were a single global entity is helpful.

Yeah but that's a key part of evangelism, isn't it?

Ignore everything I've written about how farming needs to change, project my view instead as a "meat industry shill" who unwaveringly supports everything "big meat (WTF?) does.

It's clear they've never been anywhere near farming, most farmers loathe the big processors

 

[editor]

Did you even read the article? You've been giving examples of bad farming. This is an example of much better farming, which isn't having those destructive effects.

But you're not interested in that debate, are you? Unless it involves ENDING ALL MEAT AND DAIRY, you're not interested in how to improve things.

You're completely ignoring the discussion about the horrendous impact of antibiotics but if I don't immediately stop in my tracks to applaud some microscopic local scheme about a few birds the THAT'S what should be highlighted?!

Your bigotry and bias confirmation is frankly embarrassing and getting worse.

 

[Funky_monks]

‘It feels like a sign’: joy at rise in cattle egrets on wildlife-friendly UK farms

Farmers who have taken regenerative approach hail birds as indication of ecosystem health

www.theguardian.com

More death and destruction due to changes in farming.

Love a bit of regen ag, but they can be very smug.

Recall a lot of photos of thermometer readings at grass level during the heatwave showing how cool and moisture retaining their farms at soil level were (thus less moisture loss) than short grass.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

You're completely ignoring the discussion about the horrendous impact of antibiotics but if I don't immediately stop in my tracks to applaud some microscopic local scheme about a few birds the THAT'S what should be highlighted?!

Your bigotry and bias confirmation is frankly embarrassing and getting worse.

I didn't ignore it. I can't be arsed with engaging with your posts about such things precisely because of the need to add nuance to pretty much everything you say. Just because I don't like your posts doesn't mean I don't care about the issues you are raising. It just means that I don't care for the way you raise those issues.

Go fuck yourself calling me a bigot. Out of order.

 

[editor]

Clearly doesn't have a lot of love for the Egrets

Any reason why you're ignoring the discussion about antibiotics in farming?

 

[littlebabyjesus]

RESPOND TO WHAT I'VE POSTED OR BE SILENT.

 

[editor]

RESPOND TO WHAT I'VE POSTED OR BE SILENT.

Oh dear. You've gone all CAPS LOCK and outraged ON BEHALF OF SOMEONE ELSE. Calm down, FFS. I wasn't even talking to you.

 

[kabbes]

Seems to me that the most effective way to prevent antibiotics in farming would be the mandated prevention of antibiotics in farming.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Oh dear. You've gone all CAPS LOCK and outraged ON BEHALF OF SOMEONE ELSE. Calm down, FFS. I wasn't even talking to you.

Go fuck yourself.

 

[editor]

Seems to me that the most effective way to prevent antibiotics in farming would be the mandated prevention of antibiotics in farming.

Something that the powerful meat lobby is extremely reluctant to do despite the clear dangers to health. It's a fucking disgrace.

Although voluntary change can move the needle, without regulation, industry has little incentive to make the dramatic reductions needed to safeguard antibiotics. While the FDA has prohibited meat producers from using antibiotics to speed up growth— their original purpose in agriculture — some of the antibiotics that promote growth, like tylosin, are still allowed for disease prevention, a loophole that disincentivizes producers from reducing antibiotics, Wellington said: “Our concern has always been that they’re just putting a different name on the same kind of use, which is a problem.”

Big Meat just can’t quit antibiotics

Meat production is making lifesaving drugs less effective. Where’s the FDA?

www.vox.com