Industrial animal farming has caused most new infectious diseases and risks more pandemics, experts warn

[editor]

Yet more reasons to dramatically cut back on animal exploitation:

Industrial animal farming has caused most new infectious diseases in humans in the past decade – and risks starting new pandemics as animal markets have done, experts are warning.

Experts from both the UN and the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) have pinpointed animals or food of animal origin as a starting point for emerging diseases, such as Covid-19, which has killed more than 270,000 people worldwide.

And a separate report has cautioned that replacing Asia’s open-air slaughter markets with factory farming for meat would create similarly dangerous conditions for highly virulent flu strains to breed.

Valentina Rizzi, an expert in disease at the EFSA, said: “The diseases transmitted directly or indirectly from animals – including livestock – to humans are called zoonoses. A big proportion of all infectious diseases in humans are originating from animals, and more specifically the majority of emerging new infection in humans in the last 10 years really come from animals or food of animal origin.”

Inger Andersen, executive director of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) told One Earth: “The virus usually originates in the wild, is transmitted often by wild birds, bats etc into livestock – domesticated animals.

“We see it more frequently in pigs than poultry but you do see it elsewhere, too, in other animals. Of course we can’t deny that these zoonoses often take that route – this we know from science.

“And the probability is the more you have of a thing, the more that thing is going to be the likely conveyor.”

The UNEP warned in 2016 of new diseases from animals, amplified by the world’s rising population of livestock for meat and dairy.

Ms Andersen said the more we as consumers demand protein from livestock and meat, the more the market would respond.

Earlier this week researchers led by the University of Sheffield and Bath warned that intensive farming, involving overuse of antibiotics, high numbers of animals, and low genetic diversity are hotbeds for pathogens to spread.

Industrial animal farming ‘has caused most new viruses and risks further pandemics’

Exclusive: ‘Zoonoses often take that route... and the more you have of a thing, the more that thing is going to be the likely conveyor,’ says UN environment chief

www.independent.co.uk

 

[Yuwipi Woman]

In addition to introducing new viruses, it has made old diseases worse. Things like e-coli used to be relatively harmless, until confinement operations and the overuse of antibiotics made it more virulent:

5 modern diseases grown by factory farming

You are what you eat...and that's the problem

theweek.com

I've understood for a while that our food system is messed up, but I didn't see it for as bad as it really is until I saw meat processors trying to send sick people to work regardless of the consequences to not only the workers themselves, but the community as a whole. I live just a few miles from one of these plants and I can see the day-to-day toll that keeping the plant open has on community health. I can also see the callous attitude of lawmakers. Their response has been to stop recording the numbers of sick people.

 

[Yuwipi Woman]

Only when the tide goes out,” Warren Buffett observed, “do you discover who’s been swimming naked.” For our society, the Covid-19 pandemic represents an ebb tide of historic proportions, one that is laying bare vulnerabilities and inequities that in normal times have gone undiscovered. Nowhere is this more evident than in the American food system. A series of shocks has exposed weak links in our food chain that threaten to leave grocery shelves as patchy and unpredictable as those in the former Soviet bloc. The very system that made possible the bounty of the American supermarket—its vaunted efficiency and ability to “pile it high and sell it cheap”—suddenly seems questionable, if not misguided. But the problems the novel coronavirus has revealed are not limited to the way we produce and distribute food. They also show up on our plates, since the diet on offer at the end of the industrial food chain is linked to precisely the types of chronic disease that render us more vulnerable to Covid-19.

The Sickness in Our Food Supply | Michael Pollan

“Only when the tide goes out,” Warren Buffett observed, “do you discover who’s been swimming naked.” For our society, the Covid-19 pandemic represents an ebb tide of historic proportions, one that is laying bare vulnerabilities and inequities that in normal times have gone undiscovered. Nowhere...

www.nybooks.com

While I don't agree with everything that Michael Pollen has to say about food, he does have a decent grip on some of the problems with our current food system.

 

[gentlegreen]

Scarily, several people died in Germany some years back because alfalfa sprouts were grown from seeds contaminated with e-coli - presumably because alfalfa is a bulk agricultural fodder crop.

 

[Yuwipi Woman]

Scarily, several people died in Germany some years back because alfalfa sprouts were grown from seeds contaminated with e-coli - presumably because alfalfa is a bulk agricultural fodder crop.

My mother almost died from a camplobactor infection. As it was, she was in the hospital for more than a week on IV antibiotics. It completely shut down her kidneys. Its taken her several years to come back from it and she still has diminished kidney function.

 

[souljacker]

Scarily, several people died in Germany some years back because alfalfa sprouts were grown from seeds contaminated with e-coli - presumably because alfalfa is a bulk agricultural fodder crop.

Isn't e.coli present in a lot of soil? Lettuces, bean sprouts, radishes etc have all been found to have e.coli and it's industrial farming that causes it IIRC.

 

[gentlegreen]

Isn't e.coli present in a lot of soil? Lettuces, bean sprouts, radishes etc have all been found to have e.coli and it's industrial farming that causes it IIRC.

more likely organic farming - in terms of what's being used to fertilise the crops in any case ...

 

[Yuwipi Woman]

more likely organic farming - in terms of what's being used to fertilise the crops in any case ...

In the US at least, some of the fertilizer in use comes from solid waste processing for cities:

Municipal waste for fertilizer can be risky | Farm Progress

For farmers Bill Boyce and Bob McElmurray free nitrogen fertilizer from sewage sludge seemed like a good thing. Sewage

www.farmprogress.com

It has the exact problems you might expect.

 

[Yuwipi Woman]

Isn't e.coli present in a lot of soil? Lettuces, bean sprouts, radishes etc have all been found to have e.coli and it's industrial farming that causes it IIRC.

Its naturally present in the guts of some animals, including humans. There are a number of strains of it and only some are harmful. What industrial agriculture did was to concentrate the bad strains in our food animals, feel them antibiotics which made it resistant. and then passed it on to humans.

 

[gentlegreen]

In the US at least, some of the fertilizer in use comes from solid waste processing for cities:

Municipal waste for fertilizer can be risky | Farm Progress

For farmers Bill Boyce and Bob McElmurray free nitrogen fertilizer from sewage sludge seemed like a good thing. Sewage

www.farmprogress.com

I once bought a tub of sewage pellets in the UK and later, my brother who works in the industry was surprised that it had ever been sold in the shops.
There was a major problem with PCBs in the waste stream at one point...

 

[Yuwipi Woman]

I once bought a tub of sewage pellets in the UK and later, my brother who works in the industry was surprised that it had ever been sold in the shops.
There was a major problem with PCBs in the waste stream at one point...

Yeah, I'm not surprised. Even if you compost it first, there's going to be problems with it.

 

[gentlegreen]

It's a great shame.
I suppose the alternative would be to reprocess the waste to isolate the nitrogen, but I imagine the good old Haber process using freshly- drilled fossil fuel feedstock is going to be cheaper ...

 

[Funky_monks]

If this is anything like a similar article I read in scientific American.
For "most" new diseases, read "two" (origin of one still disputed).

Compare and contrast the hundreds of zoonoses that pre date industrial farming (and/or have nothing to do with livestock).

The e-coli thing is interesting. It is thought that it is down to a lack of exposure at an early age, plus increasingly sanitary conditions.
It's why farm kids seem not to get e.coli based infections.

 

[editor]

If this is anything like a similar article I read in scientific American.
For "most" new diseases, read "two" (origin of one still disputed).

There's several studies referenced in the OP and the experts seem pretty sure that there's more than one new disease coming from industrial farming.

Experts from both the UN and the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) have pinpointed animals or food of animal origin as a starting point for emerging diseases, such as Covid-19, which has killed more than 270,000 people worldwide.

And a separate report has cautioned that replacing Asia’s open-air slaughter markets with factory farming for meat would create similarly dangerous conditions for highly virulent flu strains to breed.

Valentina Rizzi, an expert in disease at the EFSA, said: “The diseases transmitted directly or indirectly from animals – including livestock – to humans are called zoonoses. A big proportion of all infectious diseases in humans are originating from animals, and more specifically the majority of emerging new infection in humans in the last 10 years really come from animals or food of animal origin.”

 

[Funky_monks]

There's several studies referenced in the OP and the experts seem pretty sure that there's more than one new disease coming from industrial farming.

A few studies, yes, two diseases: Swine flu H1N1 and Avian Influenza H5N1. AI is the one who's origin is disputed. It was first discovered in Chinese hens, but the biosecurity is such that they cannot be certain that they did not get it from contact with wild birds.

Plenty of zoonoses from livestock came into existence prior to the advent of industrial agriculture. Off the top of my head: bTB, anthrax, orf, brucellosis, cryptosporidosis, ringworm.

Plenty exist that have nothing to do with agriculture: COVID-19, SARS, Ebola (I think), Rabies, Lyme's disease, Leptospirosis, Bubonic plague, etc etc

(NB - for the pedants, those diseases are off the top of my head, not an exhaustive list).

The fact is that we exist in a biological arms race with diseases, and as long as we have any kind of contact with animals, it is likely that disease organisms will mutate to infect human hosts.

 

[campanula]

I hesitate to post editor because I know you are deeply invested in not eating animal products...but I honestly think the pertinent word here is 'industrial'...but all these arguments can get very fractious...especially when a single issue is emphasised, rather than the overarching damage done by intensive farming - both pastoral and agricultural.

 

[hash tag]

isnt battery farming one of the reasons the Americans bleach chickens?

 

[Funky_monks]

isnt battery farming one of the reasons the Americans bleach chickens?

No, it's poor hygiene in their broiler industry - they don't clean/remove litter in the same way that we do, so campylobacter is an issue.

 

[StoneRoad]

tbh, I think the more serious aspect of this is the development of anti-biotic resistant mircrobes.

 

[Funky_monks]

tbh, I think the more serious aspect of this is the development of anti-biotic resistant mircrobes.

That's why the use of prophylactic antibiotics is banned in the EU. Even if it wasn't, the supermarkets want antibiotic use reduced (and they wield all the power in the agri food supply chain - they collect consumer data, therefore purport to speak for them).
Ergo antibiotic use in the poultry sector decreased by 80% between 2012 and 2018 and by 60% in pigs between 2015 and 2018 (farmantibiotics.org for that statistic, but you can find comparable ones elsewhere).

The poultry industry is doing some really interesting stuff with garlic powder and other herb extracts to reduce incidence of disease. I think it's oregano that's proven surprisingly effective, but I'm just guessing - it was explained to me the last time I was on a broiler unit, and you could definitely smell it.

 

[CNT36]

That's why the use of prophylactic antibiotics is banned in the EU. Even if it wasn't, the supermarkets want antibiotic use reduced (and they wield all the power in the agri food supply chain - they collect consumer data, therefore purport to speak for them).
Ergo antibiotic use in the poultry sector decreased by 80% between 2012 and 2018 and by 60% in pigs between 2015 and 2018 (farmantibiotics.org for that statistic, but you can find comparable ones elsewhere).

The poultry industry is doing some really interesting stuff with garlic powder and other herb extracts to reduce incidence of disease. I think it's oregano that's proven surprisingly effective, but I'm just guessing - it was explained to me the last time I was on a broiler unit, and you could definitely smell it.

Sounds like they're just selling seasoned chickens.

 

[Spymaster]

The poultry industry is doing some really interesting stuff with garlic powder and other herb extracts to reduce incidence of disease.

As in wafting it around as a disinfectant, or feeding it to the birds?

 

[Funky_monks]

As in wafting it around as a disinfectant, or feeding it to the birds?

Adding it into feed/water in various ratios at various times.
The reduction in things like campylobacter has been really promising.

 

[CNT36]

Just found this from 2012 about garlic and campylobacter as well as this from 2017 about options, including a little about garlic, for targeting campylobacter if anyone's interested. The second link highlights a few issues around bacteria that could be of more general interest and of relevance to this thread.

 

[farmerbarleymow]

Saw a review of this book recently which looks interesting -

Big Farms Make Big Flu: Dispatches on Influenza, Agribu…

The first collection to explore infectious disease, agr…

www.goodreads.com

 

[editor]

Saw a review of this book recently which looks interesting -

Big Farms Make Big Flu: Dispatches on Influenza, Agribu…

The first collection to explore infectious disease, agr…

www.goodreads.com

It seems very well reviewed:

In Big Farms Make Big Flu, Rob Wallace stands boldly on the shoulders of giants in clearly expressing the problems with our agroindustrial system that so many already see but far too few are willing to say. With mordant wit and a keen literary sensibility, Wallace follows the story of this dysfunctional—and dangerous—system wherever it may lead, without regard to petty concerns of discipline or the determined ignorance of the commentariat and mainstream research institutions. Big Farms Make Big Flu shows the power, possibility, and indeed, absolute necessity of political ecology, lest we not only fail to properly understand the world, but fail to change it.”

—M. Jahi Chappell, Ph.D., Senior Staff Scientist, Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy (IATP)

These essays put you in the company of a delightful mind. Wallace is filled with curiosity, deep learning, and robust skepticism. In his company, you’ll learn about phylogeography, clades and imperial epizoology. He can also weave a mean story, with the kinds of big picture analysis that puts him alongside minds like Mike Davis’s. Who else can link the end of British colonial rule in China or the devaluation of the Thai Baht to the spread of bird flu? This collection is a bracing innoculant against the misinformation that will be spewed in the next epidemic by the private sector, government agencies and philanthropists. My copy is highlighted on almost every page. Yours will be too.

—Raj Patel, Research Professor, University of Texas at Austin, author, Stuffed and Starved: The Hidden Battle for the World Food System

Monthly Review | Big Farms Make Big Flu: Dispatches on Infectious Disease, Agribusiness, and the Nature of Science

Thanks to breakthroughs in production and food science, agribusiness has been able to devise new ways to grow more food and get it more places more quickly. There is no shortage of news items on the…

monthlyreview.org

There was a piece in the Guardian recently too:

Is factory farming to blame for coronavirus?

Scientists are tracing the path of Sars-CoV-2 from a wild animal host – but we also need to look at the part played in the outbreak by industrial food production

www.theguardian.com

 

[Saul Goodman]

Did we not have lots of deadly diseases and pandemics long before factory farming?

 

[NoXion]

Did we not have lots of deadly diseases and pandemics long before factory farming?

Yes, we did. More of them, in fact, because people back then tended to keep animals in cities a lot more than now.

Of course that doesn't stop someone using the current pandemic - which originated from a wild animal - to ride their favourite hobby horse, even if it as tasteless as unsmoked tofu.

 

[Saul Goodman]

If we believe that the coronavirus originated from a wet market in Wuhan, how is that in any way related to factory farming? Those markets are like our farmers' markets, and about as far removed from factory farming as you could imagine.

 

[JimW]

Did we not have lots of deadly diseases and pandemics long before factory farming?

Yes, and we eradicated those by measures to control the disease vectors, among other things, so why stop that successful policy now?
The pure profit motive is usually pretty inimical but always strikes me as particularly egregious in agriculture, arable and livestock, given the clash between the imperatives of capital and various cycles and processes in nature.