Sampler Platter 05.23.09

by: Jill Richardson

Sat May 23, 2009 at 15:42:28 PM PDT

• New York is trying to bring grocery stores to food deserts. Yay! If they find a successful method of doing this, let's hope other cities steal their ideas.

• Interested in what Americans ate during the first Great Depression? Apparently beavers and squirrels were on the menu (hat tip to GastroNomalies)

• Vilsack plays dumb. Swine flu? Never heard of it. He only knows about the H1N1 flu. Riiight.

• Meanwhile, while the swine flu story is over for most of us, it's not over at the implicated Mexican Smithfield operation, which is still very invested in proving its innocence. Especially because its being sued.

• Why a school farm? The Atlantic has some ideas.

• Ever tried Mongolian cuisine? Most of us have probably never even thought about it. I had the opportunity to try some - once - and oh my god, I turned that opportunity down. When I lived in China I had 2 friends from Inner Mongolia. After a trip home, they returned to Beijing with a "treat" for me - some "Mongolian dairy snacks" as they put it. And that was NOT something I was interested in eating. The "snacks" were approximately the size and shape of Cheetos but they were white and looked moist. And there was no freaking way I was putting them in my mouth. I ate dog and testicles in China, but I had to draw the line somewhere. My friends wanted to see me taste them but I awkwardly explained that I wanted to share them with other Americans so I'd taste them later. Fortunately, the food described in this article sounds a bit more appetizing.

• BlogHer is having a foodie conference.

• Yay to the Center for Food Safety, who says that reliance on biotech in a food aid bill is a step in the wrong direction.

• IATP cleverly writes about "seeing the forest through the corn." With a title like that, you KNOW they are talking about Iowa - and a forest in Iowa that is home to many endangered and threatened species.

• In Israel, owls are replacing chemicals to do the job of pest control. Very cool!

Oops, Meat From Infected Pigs Isn't Safe After All, Says WHO

by: Jill Richardson

Thu May 07, 2009 at 16:13:20 PM PDT

Here's the Cliff notes of what you should know:

* Flu viruses can survive freezing, be present on thawed meat

* Blood of H1N1 infected pigs may contain virus

* Meat from sick pigs or pigs found dead must not be consumed

* WHO drawing up guidelines to protect workers handling pigs

This stuff seems kind of obvious, doesn't it?

Sen. Bennett (R-UT) Recommends You Eat a Bacon Wrapped Burger From Wendys

by: Jill Richardson

Thu May 07, 2009 at 09:00:00 AM PDT

Utah Senator Robert Bennett drove this point home even further, specifying that you don't need to avoid bacon wrapped burgers from Wendys. I'd just like to remind Sen. Bennett that perhaps he should avoid bacon wrapped burgers, and not because of swine flu. After all, swine flu won't kill you but heart disease will.

The hearing was held by the Senate Ag Appropriations subcommittee, and there was no mention of any concern over unhealthy conditions on factory farms brought up. They noted that no swine are known to be ill in the U.S. or Mexico and that the sick pigs in Canada were infected by a human. Whether or not this particular flu outbreak came from factory farmed pigs, I think it's a good opportunity for us all to examine the health risks associated with factory farming, yet the Senate committee had no interest in doing that. Their only concern is that Americans and U.S. trading partners continue buying pork.

Swine Flu Traced to U.S. Factory Farm

by: Jill Richardson

Mon May 04, 2009 at 20:00:00 PM PDT

Scientists have traced the genetic lineage of the new H1N1 swine flu to a strain that emerged in 1998 in U.S. factory farms, where it spread and mutated at an alarming rate. Experts warned then that a pocket of the virus would someday evolve to infect humans, perhaps setting off a global pandemic...

Columbia University biomedical informaticist Raul Rabadan added new information on the virus' family history... His description paralleled that of other researchers who had analyzed the new strains, but with an extra bit of detail. Six of the genes in swine flu looked to be descended from "H1N2 and H3N2 swine viruses isolated since 1998."

And if that's not bad enough for the factory hog farm industry, a Mexican blogger posted really yucky pictures of the implicated Smithfield operation. (H/t The Ethicurean)

Reuters Fights Conspiracy Theories - But Misses the Facts

by: Jill Richardson

Fri May 01, 2009 at 06:00:00 AM PDT

Dead pigs in China, evil factory farms in Mexico and an Al Qaeda plot involving Mexican drug cartels are a few wild theories seeking to explain a deadly swine flu outbreak that has killed up to 176 people.

Nobody knows for sure but scientists say the origins are in fact far less sinister and are likely explained by the ability of viruses to mutate and jump from species to species as animals and people increasingly live closer to each other.

Aha! People who think that the swine flu might come from swine are as crazy as people who think that Osama bin Ladin caused it! Fortunately, a HuffPo piece by David Kirby gives us the facts. To refute the Reuters claim that "Some of the rumors mentioned noxious fumes from pig manure and flies, neither a known vector for flu viruses," Kirby says:

Last year, the Pew Commission on Industrial Farm Animal Practices issued a landmark report that described air emissions - or "noxious fumes"- measured outside large concentrated animal feeding operations, (CAFOs), or factory farms. In addition to toxic gases such as ammonia, methane, hydrogen sulfide and others, scientists also measured high levels of particulate matter and bioaerosols blowing out from the giant vents at the end of each massive animal confinement.

"Particulate matter associated with CAFOs is composed of fecal matter, feed materials, skin cells, microorganisms, and the products of microbial action on feces and feed," the report said.

He adds that:

La Gloria, Veracruz, thought to be the epicenter of the pandemic, is close to a massive hog complex that generates the same amount of raw sewage as a small city every day.

Oh, and the flies? Yeah, turns out those can carry the flu virus too.

Swine Flu, NAFTA and U.S. farm subsidies

by: Farm Bill Girl

Thu Apr 30, 2009 at 22:20:42 PM PDT

However, the larger connections to U.S. farm subsidy policy, NAFTA have not been adequately understood and explored.  

What Swine Flu Tells Us About Factory Farms

by: Jill Richardson

Thu Apr 30, 2009 at 19:37:18 PM PDT

Mmm, Pork! Says Vilsack (And Stop Calling it Swine Flu!)

by: Jill Richardson

Thu Apr 30, 2009 at 08:00:00 AM PDT

"This morning I had pork for breakfast. Last night I had pork. I'm going to continue to eat pork and I'm going to encourage American consumers to do the same," Vilsack said in an interview on CNN this afternoon from the White House.

I'd just like to remind him about the recent study that showed that daily consumption of beef and pork leads to increased chances that you will die in the next 10 years. That makes his pork consumption only slightly better than this photo op of a British politician and his 4 year old daughter taken during the mad cow scare:

Vilsack wants the news media to switch to using the scientific term for the virus, H1N1, rather than swine flu.

Vilsack's request comes on the heels of a similar request by several meat industry lobby groups. If I were Vilsack, I'd just cross my fingers that the next food scare happens over a food I'd prefer to eat. Chocolate perhaps? Microbrewed beer? I'd gladly drink a nice ale or a stout to prove that the country's beers are safe.

On a more serious note, this is all pretty ridiculous. Whether or not this flu came from a factory farm, I don't think the fact that factory farms are a problem is really up for debate. Vilsack comes from a state totally overrun by them so he should know best. No, the flu doesn't come from pork, but that doesn't mean that Vilsack or anyone else should be promoting an unsustainable industry with a product now shown to lead to increased mortality if consumed frequently.

A Tragic Day in Egypt

by: Jill Richardson

Wed Apr 29, 2009 at 18:37:04 PM PDT

At one large pig farming center just north of Cairo, scores of angry farmers blocked the street to prevent Health Ministry workers in trucks and bulldozers from coming in to slaughter the animals. Some pelted the vehicles with rocks and shattered their windshields and the workers left without killing any pigs.

"We remind Hosni Mubarak that we are all Egyptians. Where does he want us to go?" said Gergis Faris, a 46-year-old pig farmer in another part of Cairo who collects garbage to feed his animals. "We are uneducated people, just living day by day and trying to make a living, and now if our pigs are taken from us without compensation, how are we supposed to live?"

I visited Egypt, briefly, a decade ago. I've been to over 20 countries around the world and I saw the most devastating, abject poverty in Egypt, more so than in any other country I've visited. It is absolutely criminal that the country is taking away the livelihoods of these poor farmers without any justification (since the disease is being spread among humans NOT PIGS). Taking away their animals without any compensation (as the article implied was the case) is particularly egregious.

Swine Industry to Media: Don't Call It Swine Flu

by: Jill Richardson

Wed Apr 29, 2009 at 06:00:00 AM PDT

The North American Meat Processors Association, the National Meat Association and the American Meat Institute all issued statements asking the media to pick up on the phrase "North American flu" or other, accurate references to the hybrid A/H1N1 flu strain that is the culprit in the ongoing outbreak.

Let's see if that one catches on in the next week or two. I do seem to remember how the "bailout" became the "rescue plan" practically overnight last fall. I'm proud to say that according to Meatingplace, we here on the blogs are part of the problem:

Bloggers overwhelmingly repeated the information initially published on the Grist site, connecting the outbreak to "factory" farming, and sneered at Smithfield's releases attempting to set the record straight.

By "sneer," I wonder if they are referring to Natasha's post on Change.org.

In other news, The GOP Reaffirms Pro-Swine Position. (OK, not really, that's from Andy Borowitz, the writer of a one-man Onion.)

Pot Luck: Swine Flu Version

by: Jill Richardson

Tue Apr 28, 2009 at 19:00:00 PM PDT

The caption on this is Swine Flu FAIL.

Here are a few great articles that provide new insight on the swine flu issue:

• Swine Flu Reveals: What's Bad for the Environment is Bad for Human Health (Treehugger)
• Pork Chops Won't Give You Swine Flu, but Here Are Other Reasons to Abstain (Treehugger)
• What Airports and Factory Farms Have in Common (Green Fork Blog)
• Tracking the Swine Flu (Googlemaps)
• The swine flu crisis lays bare the meat industry's monstrous power (The Guardian)
• The Last Great Swine Flu Epidemic (Salon)
• Pork: The Other Blight Meat - Will President Obama Have a Decimated Ag Economy in the Next 100 Days? (Obama Foodorama)
• What Happens to the Food Supply During a Pandemic? Preparedness Expert Michael Osterholm and the Swine Flu Outbreak (Obama Foodorama)
• Patient Zero Identified in Mexican Flu Outbreak? (HuffPo)
• Pulitzer Prize winning series on the North Carolina hog industry

Sampler Platter

by: Jill Richardson

Tue Apr 28, 2009 at 15:00:00 PM PDT

• Tom Laskawy comments on the reports that phthalates make us fat(ter). Here are my two cents: The focus on food should continue because crap eating is crap eating whether or not you get fat from it, and the focus on eliminating phthalates (used in PVC plastic) should ALSO continue because we know they do bad things OTHER THAN make us fat.

• Mark Bittman tells how to make sunchoke fritters. I'm a fan of sunchokes, but I've never tried them as fritters. (In fact, being raised in a fat-phobic Jewish family, the only time a year I got anything that remotely resembled a "fritter" was Hanukkah.)

• Alternet takes on marijuana legalization. They say 4 in 10 have smoked it, yet millions still get busted. And among those millions are my own friends and family, and perhaps yours too. The ridiculous war on pot hurts all of us. It's time to call a truce, or maybe even just wave a white flag and admit that pot is the rightful winner.

• This idea of highrise farms gets trotted out every so often as the possible silver bullet to solve all of our problems. I'm a skeptic. What do you think?

• No patents on seeds? Marion Nestle recommends we check out a report that calls for just that.

• Marion Nestle also shares info on banned pesticides in Chilean farmed salmon. One more good reason to say no to farmed fish. Particularly farmed carnivorous fish.

• Good things come in threes, right? I've got a third good one from Marion Nestle. The title is Who needs bioterrorism when we've got manure lagoons. I soooo agree. Osama doesn't need to make us sick from our food supply because we do that all by ourselves.

• Consumers Union speaks up about an issue I've been yelling about on this site - the FDA wants to delay a new "feed ban" rule by 60 days, leaving us open to increased risk of mad cow disease for an additional two months.

• Scary news from Environmental Health News (although not surprising at all): Together, two common pesticides may increase risk of Parkinson's disease.

• And now for some good news: The LA Times reports on hospitals adding fresh, organic foods to their menus. Yay!

Swine Flu & What You Should Know About the Hog Industry

by: Jill Richardson

Mon Apr 27, 2009 at 18:00:00 PM PDT

The number of hog farms fell by more than 70 percent between 1992 and 2004, whereas the hog inventory remained stable. The average hog operation grew from 945 head in 1992 to 2,589 head in 1998 and to 4,646 head in 2004. The share of the hog inventory on operations with 2,000 or more head increased from less than 30 percent to nearly 80 percent. Operations with 5,000 or more head held more than 50 percent of the hog inventory in 2004. - The Changing Economics of U.S. Hog Production

What about Mexico? It seems that Mexico also experienced consolidation of the hog sector during the same period of time. NAFTA is what allowed Smithfield to buy up Mexico's top hog company. Smithfield aimed for vertical integration in Mexico and planned to capitalize on cheaper labor costs in Mexico to produce pork on the cheap and then export it to the U.S.

As for the flu itself, hogs get the flu the same way people do. Just like your chances of getting the flu go up if you hang out in a preschool class where the children sneeze on you and don't wash their hands (my mom teaches preschool, I would know), pigs are more likely to contract a disease in the crowded unsanitary conditions of a factory farm - FAR more disgusting than your average preschool class.

My point is that we haven't been factory farming hogs for very long, and it took only about a decade to produce a deadly disease (or two, if you count MRSA). Perhaps that should be telling us something?