Which is worse Factory Farms or Wet Markets
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Farming UK describes this farm as follows “Hoads Farm was first established in 1978 and helped pioneer the growth in commercial free range egg production” 2. The farmer was quoted as saying “The British egg industry operates to very high standards that Hoads Farm strives to not only meet but, wherever possible, exceed”
🔗 Source: Hoads Farm, near Rye, has RSPCA membership reinstated following inspection
RSPCA Assured UK Egg farm
“Commercial poultry farms, “wet markets,” (where live birds and other animals
are sold), backyard poultry farms, commercial and family poultry slaughtering facilities,
swine farms, human dietary habits and the global trade in exotic animals have all been implicated in the spread of influenza A viruses (Greger, 2006)”.
What the data says
A systematic review Of 364 Avian Flu outbreaks totally 58,709,463 individual birds origin of outbreak was:
🔗 Source: Global avian influenza outbreaks 2010–2016: a systematic review of their distribution, avian species and virus subtype
Experts say “Factory Farms are an ideal breeding ground for the next pandemic”
we are “playing Russian roulette” with our current system of factory farming animals.”
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“We’ve seen the devastating effects of a pandemic firsthand: the loss of human life, the economic toll, and the impact on everything from mental health to children’s education. Which is why, as Covid-19 spread, people looked for a way to prevent future outbreaks.
In the US, people started to call for the closure of “wet markets” overseas. Some research suggested that the many different species living closely together in these markets might have allowed the virus to mutate and jump to humans.
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Martha Nelson, who studies viruses at the National Institutes of Health, says that if we’re really serious about preventing a future pandemic, we also need to look closer to home. “I think it’s really easy to think that pandemics come from other places,” she explains, “I think it’s really easy to think that they’re foreign invaders coming from other people who were doing things in a bad way. And I certainly would never underplay the importance of wet markets and all the opportunities for novel pathogens to emerge there. But I think it’s
sometimes hard to see things in your own backyard.”
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Nelson has studied our system of raising pigs closely, and she argues that by moving pigs across the country and raising large numbers of pigs in very close proximity, we’re creating ideal conditions for a dangerous influenza virus to develop. And since she’s also seen how easily pigs can spread novel viruses to humans, she’s even more concerned. Given the frequency of pig to human transmission, she says, we’re “playing Russian roulette” with our current system of factory farming animals.”
🔗 Source: Factory farms are an ideal breeding ground for the next pandemic
Slaughterhouses vs Wet Markets
Slaughterhouses are modern , industrialised production lines, the end point of factory farming . The main difference is that 1000s are slaughtered everyday in factory farms where markets it tends to slaughtered to order.
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“If you actually want to create global pandemics, then build factory farms”
🔗 Source: Dr Michael Greger ‘Bird Flu: A Virus of Our Own Hatching’.
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“Intensification of livestock production, especially pigs and poultry, facilitates disease transmission by increasing population size and density”
🔗 Source: Zoonosis emergence linked to agricultural intensification and environmental change
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“Zoonosis is really not the big issue with Avian Influenza (although it is evidential of the transmission across to humans of these viruses regularly). The main problem and threat is evolution of new strains of human influenza and this usually involves a process of mixing over time, with genetic material acquired by the virus from both human, pig and poultry (inclusive of domestic waterfowl) viral sources mixing. The last emergent pandemic flu had genetic origins from pig industry from at least 3 continents along with bird genes reassorting/recombining with a human influenza virus. It is the simple presence of poultry and pig industry involving billions of birds and pigs globally that is a key pandemic risk factor”
Professor Richard Kock, MA VMB VMD Prof Wildlife Health and Emerging Diseases Royal Veterinary College London
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