Certainly by now you’ve heard about the recent recall of meat–143 million pounds of beef recalled due to concerns about possible contamination. The Humane Society secretly video-taped horrific treatment of sick cows at a meat processing facility. The concern? That animals too sick to stand, aka “downer cattle,” were abused and then carried via forklift to the slaughtering houses. I personally don’t eat beef but if I did, I wouldn’t want to eat an animal so sick he couldn’t stand. And I most definitely would not want to support a company that mistreated their animals. The thought of what they did to those poor cows sickens me. (A whole other issue is why the USDA was oblivious to what was happening at this plant–I certainly expect more out of this regulatory agency!)
If you eat meat, I encourage you to make informed decisions about the meat you buy (see here for one place to start). Whether it’s beef, pork, poultry, or fish–how are these animals treated, how are they raised, what are they fed, what drugs, if any, are administered, is the food processed in any way? You may feel like the meat industry is so large, what can a single consumer like you do? As always, you can vote with your dollar. Support the companies that care, that make good decisions, and refuse to give your money to the ones that don’t stand up to your standards. We have a responsibility to the animals we consume to make sure they are treated properly and we have a responsibility to ourselves to ensure that we eat only the highest quality food.
