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Farmacology

Johns Hopkins researchers are investigating a troubling potential source of resistant pathogens: the American farm.

http://www.jhu.edu/jhumag/0609web/farm.html

If it has genetic markers from pigs, then pigs at least must be carriers. While this would not imply transmission by eating, it does imply transmission by physical contact with pigs. It's notable that the letter (as you reported it) did not deny this.

And besides, it's not like the pork industry has anything to hide. The "farmers" they claim to be protecting are corporate employees, and the operations are not "farms" but factories.

And let's not forget the 25 million gallons of hog waste that contaminated the North Carolina countryside in 1995 after a huge waste lagoon burst.

If anything reflects poorly on the pork industry, it's the pork industry.

Mark
While there is some vertical integration in the hog business, the majority of hogs processed in the U.S. are still raised on independent (non-corporate) farms. The vertically-integrated operations, while suffering, are not hurting nearly as bad from the fallout of "swine flu" (primarily markets collapsing as a result of contrived pork export bans for "health" reasons) as the family farmers.

Ed,
The majority of the hog industry is integrated. Although some "farmers" may be contract operators living on slave wages (with whom I sympathize), I quote from a paper written by Tufts University researchers
in Dec 2007:

"The hog sub-sector in particular demonstrates high levels of vertical integration and industrialization."
and
"four hog companies control nearly 50% of all hog production in the United States, and four control 64% of pork
packing"

How much more integrated would you like it be before it becomes officially "corporate"?

reference:
Living High on the Hog:
Factory Farms, Federal Policy, and the
Structural Transformation of Swine Production
Elanor Starmer and Timothy A. Wise
Dec 2007, Tufts University

While it's true that "eating pork" isn't the cause of swine flu, many experts believe producing it is the cause -- that both swine flu and avian flu are products of intensive factory farming. The warehousing of billions of chickens and pigs in cramped quarters and feeding them massive doses of antibiotics and hormones is a perfect breeding ground for these deadly viruses.

But factory farmers get a free ticket from government and the media who allow the powerful pork lobby to dictate policy and even demand that we change the name of swine flu to something else. Changing the name does nothing to change the deadly breeding ground where these viruses proliferate.

Here's a good article about Smithfield Pork in Rolling Stone Magazine. Check out the cover photo:

http://tinyurl.com/y77kvm

there is an obvious way to reduce transmission of avian and swine flu: stop buying factory farmed meats and support the small sustainable farmer. A little more cost upfront for a higher quality product in exchange for longterm better health (and lower medical costs to boot), a cleaner environment (reducing cost of cleaning up after toxic lagoon spills, which won't happen with properly raised animals), what's not to like?

Sandra, I understand your point. Local sounds like a good idea.

But with meat consumption at an all-time high, there is no viable way local farms can supply meat to 5.6 million Marylanders at current rates of consumption (currently about 3/5 lb (9.6 oz) per person per day nationally).

If total meat intake drops to 2 oz per person per day, local farms might (emphasize might) be able to supply that. Otherwise we risk generating even more public health impacts, environmental degradation and animal cruelty.

No matter how it's sliced, large scale meat consumption is simply not sustainable in any sense of the word.

I agree Mark, high levels of meat consumption is unsustainable and even unhealthy (too much protein overloads the kidneys). It is also unnecessary to eat large amounts of meat, and most traditional cultures did not eat large amounts of meat (with the obvious exceptions of those cultures with little/no access to fruit/veggies such as Inuit, Siberians, etc). If most people consumed more fruit/veggies/grains and stopped eating "cheap" fast food "meat" in favor of more expensive, higher quality real meat on special occasions (the way we used to eat 50 years ago) not only would they be healthier but the planet would be too.

2 flu strains in 1 pig led to new H1N1
Swine flus merged, jumped to humans

http://www.chicagotribune.com/health/chi-flu-virus_latsep13,0,1040634.story