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Health, Milk and Meat
In the U.S. cows get pumped full of hormones and antibiotics and pesticides that leave residues in milk and in meat, which is then consumed by people. That is why there is a strange phenomenon of girls prematurely reaching puberty at the age of 9, and there is a higher number of both men and women contracting breast cancer. Additionally, because people are consuming the antibiotics in meat and milk, it causes a higher resistance to drugs, therefore encouraging a spread of extremely resistant bacteria.
The percentage of meat/dairy eating mothers with significant levels of DDT in their breast milk is 99%. The percentage of vegan mothers with significant levels of DDT in their breast milk is 8%.
“Eighty percent of all antibiotics in the United States are given not to people to cure disease but to animals to make them fatten up and enable them to survive unhygienic confinement in factory farms,” according to Ronnie Cummins, national director of the Organic Consumers Association.
The European Union has banned the use of hormones in the meat industry, so, while the meat consumed in Europe doesn’t have the same levels of antibiotics and hormones, it is still far from “clean.” Although the general practice of using antibiotics and hormones is banned in the EU, the use of chemicals in feed and in the pesticides in corn and grass for feed is NOT banned. Though, it is probably the lesser of the two evils.
Samuel Epstein, now a professor emeritus of Environmental and Occupational Medicine at the University of Illinois at Chicago, says today: “We’re dealing with a bunch of cowboys. There’s no inspection. Even if the hormones are administered properly, it’s not good.” He has estimated that a young boy who eats two hamburgers in a day could raise his hormone levels by as much as 10 percent. He also points to elevated rates of reproductive cancers, such as an 88 percent increase in prostate cancer since 1975. Epstein’s concerns have been borne out by the National Toxicology Program’s Board of Counselors, which put estrogen – one of the growth hormones used in beef production – on the list of known carcinogens in 2000. [Source: Alternet: Chemical Farm]
Because of the general (hormone) policies practiced by the American meat industry, Europe has banned all hormone beef imports coming from North America. There was, however, a backlash by the U.S and Canada against the EU. The two countries went to the World Trade Organization (WTO) to argue that the EU was violating principles of free trade. Ignoring the issue of the EU’s argument of consumer safety, the WTO voted in favor of North America and levied a $100,000 per year fine on Europe. Rather than lifting the ban, the EU would rather pay the fine every year, and has been since 1999. However, as a small compromise, the EU agreed to accept hormone beef for pet food (Don’t feed commercial pet food to your dogs and cats!), as well as accepting a small quota of non-hormone beef.
Environmental Consequences
Water is a natural resource that is becoming harder and harder to harvest and an obvious way to subvert the problem would be to reduce livestock production. Examples: 1) More than half of the water used is for livestock production; 2) It takes 5,000 gallons of water to produce a pound of beef. It takes 25 gallons of water to produce a pound of wheat.
The number of acres of forest cleared for land used for the production of meat is 260 million acres. The current rate of species extinction due to destruction of tropical rainforests for meat grazing and other uses is 1,000 per year. [Source: Vegecyber]
This can go on further, bringing into the mad mix other problems involving a meat-centered diet: world hunger, fair trade, cancer rates, cholestorol issues, dioxin, ethics, etc., but I’m going to end this post with a call to action. Click here to: join the campaign to stop the absolutely insane and detrimental policies in the food industry.
[Sources: Organic Consumers, Wallstreet Journal: Bovine Growth Hormone in Milk, Must Reads: Alternet: Chemical Farm, Chicken: The Dangerous Transformation of America’s Favorite Food, 10 Reasons to be a Vegetarian]
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