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Animal Farms Are Pumping Up Superbugs
oxide7 writes "The philosopher Frederick Nietzsche once famously said, 'That which does not kill me, makes me stronger.' That may or may not be true for human beings, but it is certainly true for bacteria. The superbugs are among us and they are not leaving. Indeed, they are growing stronger. 'The problem is that the animal agriculture industry makes massive use of low-dose antibiotics for growth promotion and in place of effective infection prevention methods,' Young said, adding that the farm animal population is much larger than the human population. The low-dose antibiotics do not kill the disease. They make the disease stronger, more resistant to those and other antibiotics. The animals — the cattle, pigs and chickens — thus treated become superbug factories. The diseases stay in them and they wash off them to infect the surrounding environment."
well known fact. And no regulation to stop it.
Moderation is overrated.
How about we feed the animals the foods they were DESIGNED to eat (i.e. Feed Cows GRASS, Not Corn). Yes, the grass might cost more but you wouldn't need to pump them full of antibiotics.
UPS Sucks
As a vegetarian.... Actually, you know, I can't think what to write next. But I guess it doesn't matter because my smugness will get all of you going whatever I say next...
"All bugs are equal but some bugs are more equal than others." -- Something George Orwell almost wrote.
I've been trying to influence politicians on this issue for at least a decade. Feeding antibiotics to healthy farm animals is one of the several ways that the human species is trying to commit suicide, and if a /. reader wasn't previously aware of the issue you need to spend less time on /, and more time learning about the world we live in.
"It came from the cows"
"What kind of music do pirates listen to?" -Paul Maud'dib
"Yeeeaaarrrrr n' Bee!!" -Stilgar, Leader of Sietch Tabr
Even better, feed them the food they have EVOLVED to eat.
using no antibiotics and killing the diseased animals? In the long rung they would get superanimals :)
Moderation is overrated.
Rage virus. Here it comes.
Bibo Ergo Sum.
Can someone explain to me how giving animals antibiotics promotes growth of the animals?
Fly me to the moon Let me sing among those stars Let me see what spring is like On jupiter and mars
You'd still have to pump them full of antibiotics.
The environment they are in tends to be pretty bad due to trying to pack as many animals together as possible to increase profit by lowering costs.
Doubtless having animals eat the kinds of food they should actually be eating would help the situation some, though, as it would remove some of the needs for antibiotics and artificial diet balancers.
Seriously, if we are so stupid that we can't see how dangerous this is for our species we deserve to be wiped out in a horrendous antibiotic resistant plague.
Oh, wait...
###### no carrier ######
- Paul
I mean, anyone who has not had their head stuck in the ground for the past 30 years should be well aware of the whole antibiotics/superbug issue. The only possible exceptions being the evolution deniers and, I bet even many of them have some twisted concept that reconciles their philosophy with superbugs.
However, I was reading that there is a new class of antibiotics in development, which are based on immune system antigens and, for some reason (anyone know more?) are thought to, because of their mechanism of action, not be susceptible to the same problem of evolving the bacteria to survive them.
I don't know if its true or how they work but, if the article I saw a while back is right, then, they could be useful here. Then again, this just seems like a bad idea overall.
-Steve
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"
Occasionally I get to drive by a huge corporate cattle ranch while on a trip; the animal's living conditions are deplorable. No shade in a hot arid climate, and hardly enough room to move around, they pack as many animals into a corral as possible. They stand all day in wet muddy shit, costs too much to provide land to roam and people to round them up.
In my opinion, this exemplifies what is wrong with unabashed Capitalism. Who cares what happens, just make us more money now, is a philosophy ultimately doomed to failure. Time to get smart.
Did you ever wake up in the morning, with a Zombie Woof behind your eyes? -- FZ
How is this legal? If my dog gets sick I need a vet to get antibiotics, I can't just go buy them OTC can I? why can these companies abuse antibiotics?
2) transfer livestock to condensed acre-sized feed lots with barely enough room for animals to move
3) pipe sewage to huge waste ponds, then spew it out onto open ground. To hell with the neighbors who complain about the smell
4) feed livestock said antibiotics to increase production.
5) slaughter livestock, grind up by products, then feed to other livestock.
5) profit!
Evolution is an automated design process with a more complete specification than manual engineering. It also works on economies and societies, though to get results you want you have to add impedances; governments seem to instead want to add a complete set of impedances to precisely engineer a society, and of course this fails.
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Even better, feed them the food they have EVOLVED to eat.
Lick my balls and call me Sally, you fundamentalist liberal tool.
Their design by evolution... stop being fucking pedantic you know what he meant.
From what I can see, all our business leaders care about is excessive affluence. Their greed has corrupt and polluted the entire biosphere. In my opinion, these are crimes against humanity. I also believe the justice system is too corrupt and ineffective, and is unable deal with this problem. So we're probably going to be doomed by the upper class's greed and stupidity.
and call it a day.
Fuck systemd. Fuck Redhat. Fuck Soylent, too. Wait, scratch the last one.
so stop packing as many as you can in as tightly as possible...
If you would have RTFA, you would realize that the animals are being pumped full of antibiotics to increase size, not to keep them disease free.
Hoist Number One and Number Six.
George Orwell, while researching one of his books, famously said "All animals are equal, but-- HOLY SHIT IS THAT CAR A FUCKING MOSQUITO?!?!!!!!11"
The reason it increases their size is because it keeps them disease-free.
Livestock stressed by illness don't grow as fast.
"Trolls they were, but filled with the evil will of their master: a fell race..." -- J.R.R. Tolkien on Olog-hai
Animals weren't DESIGNED in the first place.
Though I guess we are in the process of designing cows to eat corn, though it'd be faster if we used fewer antibiotics...
The usual anti-biotics we used was from a Pfizer product labeled LA-200 and it is expensive at around $140 every 5-ounces: about 1/4 ounce is used for a 350lb cow when we find one with a puncture wound or laceration. I've talked with smaller family farms on what they use on their animals to prevent infections and fight infections and it's always been a simple herbal formula consisting of crushed garlic mixed with crushed black walnut and applied as a paste that is more effective than Pfizer LA-200. Ive tried this same organic mix on fungal infections on my forearms and llower legs and it works better than the expensive tube pastes from convenience stores.
What I find unsettling about LA-200 is that many of the cowboys equally take a smaller dosage by the same needle (before using on the cows though) because it's practically the same as what they would've been given from an HMO but much less expense.
Steaks taste better when you are bleeding out your eyes!
Think about all the people who don't get vaccines for one reason or another (Jenny McCarthy's hysteria for example). While the low-dose antibiotics are making the bugs stronger, they kill off the weak and infirm of our population, making the overall herd that much stronger.
Evolution at it's best!
We will bankrupt ourselves in the vain search for absolute security. -- Dwight D. Eisenhower
How about we feed the animals the foods they were DESIGNED to eat (i.e. Feed Cows GRASS, Not Corn). Yes, the grass might cost more but you wouldn't need to pump them full of antibiotics.
How, exactly, does feeding them grass instead corn require the need to 'pump them full of antibiotics'?
I am not a vegetarian, but we need to reduce our meat consumption. I'll never be a vegetarian, I'm too fond of my Sicilian-American culinary traditions, but two things need to happen: First, we need to reduce the amount of meat we consume, and we need to consume better meat when we do. This diet that America has of eating a big bucket of meat and cheese from Denny's is just ridiculous, and it's killing us on multiple fronts.
I try to follow a basic plan: Vegan (or Vegetarian) before 6pm. I try and make sure the meat I do eat for dinner is high quality. I pay a little extra for it, but the savings throughout the day balance out. There are other types of diets that would be great for reducing meat consumption without any of us thinking we're suddenly living off of soy and wheat germ. Eating smaller portions of meat, but still using it for flavoring, for instance. Even just getting the idea in our heads that we shouldn't eat meat for every single meal.
Factory farming has got to go, it's horrible on so many fronts. I'm not a foodie, and I don't have vegan super powers, and I recognize that people are on a budget, and can't shop for organic at whole foods (hell, I can't afford to, and I have a decent job). But we have to figure some kind of practical way forward, because we can't keep packing animals in to dark crates, standing in their own filth and pumping them full of drugs and then call that dinner.
Unfortunately, the problem is not in a particular case(s) of misuse, but in the generally low professionalism of medical professionals.
For example, here in Canada it has become increasingly difficult to get an antibiotic prescription. Doctors fight tooth and nail when it comes to antibiotics, and as a result, a lot of people get treated late.
I think the situation is best described by an old russian proverb: Make a fool pray, and he'll crack his forehead.
It's not the 'animal agricultural industry'. It's a bad farming practice. Your phrase implies it only happen in large corporate farms.
Also, proper application and disposal removes this issue.Almost all the antibiotics exit the animals in using or feces.
Frankly, slightly more expensive beef might be a good thing.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
It will be a long time before Congress acts, if ever. But you can protect yourself and make things better by buying meat from "organically" raised animals: animals that were raised without antibiotics and without having been raised in factory farms. Note that the "organic" label itself may be misleading depending on what you are and who uses it, so check more carefully what it means for that particular product (the label usually says it if they did go through the trouble of doing the right thing). You should also probably avoid genetically modified animals, foods, and feeds, not because the genetic modifications are harmful (usually they are not), but because many genetic modifications are intended just to enable bad and dangerous farming practices. Both of these are in your own interest (not just socially good things to do) because you yourself may run a higher risk of infection with a resistant strain if you eat animals raised on antibiotics.
Well, unfortunately, the family farmer who raises livestock is pretty much controlled by the corporations that contract the animals to him/her. On corporate farms they pretty much don't give a damn about conditions of the livestock so it's a non-issue to them. And, it's pretty hard to have grazed livestock when you have them in pens only large enough to stand in.
The problems of superbugs in livestock are old news to farmers (or agriculture geeks like myself), and any farmer that is grazing his/her herds currently probably doesn't use continous dosages of antibiotics.
It's in this issue that we start moving into economics and market forces. Americans demand cheap meet sources, and chemical science has seen that happen. It's not good for anyone involved, but as long as everyone can have meat on the table each night its not likely to change.
Awareness is very low on these issues. Watch the movie Fresh (http://www.freshthemovie.com/) to get a very well rounded view of modern corporate agriculture and people who do it differently. Very eye opening.
'nuff said
So do we extend the summaries analogy to his views on gender and race?
This is one of the many reasons I try to buy organic whenever possible. Animals (including human beings) evolved on mother nature, not synthetic chemicals and antibiotics. They are designed to eat what mother nature provides, and therefore perform best in that configuration.
For all that technology and science have to offer -- and I love technology and science -- I firmly believe that food is best left to mother nature. Food created in line with mother nature just plain tastes better, it's healthier, and it doesn't muck up the environment. I'm not saying we should do away with advanced farming techniques; what I'm saying is that synthetic chemicals have no place on my dinner plate.
Seriously, researchers have warned for years that using antibiotics in this way is a bad idea. It is also true for human patients, distributing antibiotics like candies tends to have the same effect. People use them too often or do not complete the treatment and the strongest bugs get selected and can happily repopulate an environment now void of competition.
That's why laws should change according to pressure from citizens (environment), which is what often, but not always, happens :)
Moderation is overrated.
The thing about evolution and genetics is that there are tradeoffs. For instance, we're probably breeding cows to maximize meat production (size and muscle mass genes). This isn't free - more mass means sacrifices are made in other areas, perhaps the immune system is one area which loses effectiveness because of genetic factors related to breeding larger cows.
False.
They put antibiotics in animals regardless of their feed. And they have good reason to do so. Grass/Corn debate is crap.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
You vegetarians want to save the animals, but we carnivores are doing our part to cut down on this superbug problem. If we listened to you vegetarians, these animal farms would be a huge drain on the economy, raising animals for no practical use, and the animal population would spiral out of control. Stop shifting the blame and take responsibility to this disaster you're creating.
My webcomic
That isn't quite how it works.
Nerd rage is the funniest rage.
Actually, while there are a lot of theories (some of which are discussed in other responses), no one really knows why. It's not really curing any disease... antibiotics make even healthy animals grow faster. So actual answer to your question is no, no one can really explain this.
Generally speaking, it's not a weak immune system that causes the abundance of bacteria in food animals - it's the knee-deep fecal matter in their pens.
The mad cow disease outbreak was caused by feeding the parts that didn't get put into ground beef into the feed for other cows. Now, they're banned from that... instead they feed the bits of any other species into the cow feed, and vis-versa.
If you really want motivation to switch to grass-fed beef, do a little research into commercial meat farming. It's terrifying.
I like that idea, that's why I don't buy food from animals that have antibiotics used on them. You can too, though you'll have to ignore the people who criticize you for choosing how you spend your money.
Heh, I'm from Marietta, GA. My roommate bought a registered pit bull a month ago, and it turned out to be pregnant. Well, a few nights ago, she had the pups. And last night, we were watching to be sure that the dog didn't roll over and smother any more pups while milking. And guess what one of the pups was latched onto instead of a nipple? ;)
People are complaining that this is not news. Clearly not enough people know or at least care about this, since if enough people did, the fix is obviously to ban this way of using antibiotics. Also, to ban the prescription of antibiotics when unnecessary or even completely ineffective (viral infections such as the common cold). That these steps have not been taken show that not enough people know or understand this issue, so to those people it must be news. So it is news to some, even if it isn't to others, and it's important news.
Fear the human factories that consistently fail at completing antibotic regimens prescribed by a physician. Peeps get pissy and whine about how they feel on them, don't complete the therapy, and leave behind only the strongest of the bacteria in their bodies. When it comes back (and it will) it will only be worse, and your prescription will be less effective and you'll be more pissy cuz you'll need something stronger. Oh, and not to mention the antibacterial soap that is effectively doing the same thing in sewage and storm drains.. yum!
Kill the corn subsidies and it will no longer be cost effective to use it as feed. Frankly, its not actually cheaper. Its just that we pay for part of it with our taxes.
"Have you ever thought about just turning off the TV, sitting down with your kids, and hitting them?"
So, an environmental engineer absentmindedly decided it was worth keeping the disease and getting rid of the stress? I'm not sure legislation will work very well on this. For example, you can't legislate that the hole in the ozone layer go away, it just doesn't work like that. I didn't read the article, but, the legislation actually has to work. Does it?
Under the influence of Post-Cyberpunk Gonzo Journalism
Someone is bound to say something like; No, No, No, the dollar is god and I have god and I love business greed and greed is god. I have two gods see and we need to do this because my gods will die if not. Support business since business is the good guys and blah blah blah. IMHO, yes feed them grass and I don't care about your stank profits. Down with garbage business practices!
it's a good thing we humans steer clear of antibiotic overuse. Oh, wait...
The summary gets one thing wrong. Antibiotic resistant bacteria are not stronger than those that are nor antibiotic resistant. As a matter of fact they are weaker. Generally, the way that bacteria develop resistance to antibiotics is by shutting down the cellular mechanism that the antibiotic uses to get into the cell. However, that cellular mechanism serves a useful function in the cell (usually to bring nutrients into the bacterial cell). When antibiotic resistant bacteria are in an environment without antibiotics they generally die off over a relatively short time-span. This is why currently most infections with antibiotic resistant bacteria occur in hospitals.
That being said, excessive use of antibiotics is still a bad thing.
The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
The USDA prohibits feeding mammal tissues to ruminants.
That still leaves them room to feed chicken to cattle though.
Nerd rage is the funniest rage.
How about we feed the animals the foods they were DESIGNED to eat (i.e. Feed Cows GRASS, Not Corn).
Just because I feel like being pedantic, I'll point out that maize is a grass.
(However, I do remember a documentary that described how the diet being fed to mass market cattle alters the chemistry of their guts to promote the growth of dangerous bacterial strains.)
How about we feed the animals the foods they were DESIGNED to eat (i.e. Feed Cows GRASS, Not Corn). Yes, the grass might cost more but you wouldn't need to pump them full of antibiotics.
Thats right, we need corn for fuel!
I concur with this assessment. These people feed them all manner of antibiotics and steroids, and wonder why there are negative effects. We feed our livestock only non-GM feed that has not been treated, and they also eat bugs, grass etc., exactly what they are meant to feed on. Purely organic. The big producers are always messing with nature's way, and then when it goes wrong, they say, "wait, I have another hairbrained idea that MIGHT work." I won't eat that crap, and neither should you. BTW, ever wonder where moobs come from? Take a guess.
Some people still do. It's not something you can get at Walmart but if you live anywhere close to the country there is a good chance that:
1) There are farmers markets around. The best and freshest produce and meat money can buy, and usually competitive on price.
2) Some farmers let you just buy a side of a cow (or an entire cow). So for $x00 you can buy an entire cow. The farmer raises it, kills it and you can have a say in how it is butchered. This does require a deep freezer (unless you're going to throw one heck of a braai). Usually ends up cheaper than super market and you know exactly where your meat is coming from.
Cut out the middle man.
1) the animals use a very low, non therapeutic dose, most of which is lost in their waste.
2) there isn't any good evidence that this causes superbugs. Yes, intuitively it seems so, and there may be a mechanisim in place, and it really wouldn't surprise anyone if this turned out to be the case, but no study backs any of that up.
3) it is now that the over use of therapeutic doses causes this issue.
4) not all bugs become superbugs
5) superbug doesn't mean more virulent.
Now:
We need to understand the precise mechanism on how the antibiotics work for growth. The exact chemical reaction. Then we can produce more specific drugs.
We should be using the Swedish model. Slightly less product per animal. I I don't think a 1% increase in meat costs is going to be a big deal to any individual persons budget
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Eh? Evolution has no specification and only one requirement: Survive to reproduce.
Speaking of hippies, I stopped by my token hippy friend's place the other day and they were watching this documentary about food. It was called Food Inc. and after literally the first 5 minutes, I planted myself on the couch and watched it. I always knew our (ie. us Westerners) diet was pretty bad, but I really had no idea HOW bad the food system is. We're basically eating crap 24/7.
Long story short, I've been reading up about this topic lately and can suggest a few easily accessible resources for anyone who wants to learn a bit more:
Food Inc. - A decent documentary to get you started.
The Omnivores Dilemma - An easy read that can point in the right direction for further research.
And then we ask about disintegration: did Kentucky Fried Chicken DESCEND from the Heavens, or did someone throw their fried chicken into Heaven where it was struck by a m[i/y]sterious bolt of [en]light[e]ning first?
I say Natural Selection, but if nobody of sound mind of science was around to Select then who will decide what is the better design? Seems like nobody Selects the premaid Maccaroni at the Grocery Stores, so why hasn't the world been overpopulated and dominated by these noodles like how Islamic mudslimes have done with same lack of economy value and popularity?
http://www.foodincmovie.com
If you actually read the comment to which you replied (yeah, new here), you would see that he advocated feeding the cows grass so that "you wouldn't need to pump them full of antibiotics"
Animal Farms want to pump *clap* You Up!
Corn is a grass, more or less.
Nate
I didn't read the article, but, the legislation actually has to work. Does it?
This would actually be fairly easy. I'm not a rancher, don't have the studies and such.
Basically, Cattle farmers raise cattle the way they do because it maximizes their profits. I'm hesitant to say whether it does short, mid, or long term optimization. Probably short term.
By banning this method of raising cattle, farmers who utilize this method of raising cattle will have to find other ways. This will, in general, raise the cost of meat, but hopefully lower the social cost of antibiotic resistant bacteria.
Alternatives I can think of would include:
1. Accepting a certain lower growth rate, increase in loss of sellable meat from sick cattle.
2. Engage in alternative disease control or prevention strategies. Probably cost more for less effect than the antibiotics
2a. Washing pens out more might be one
2b. Altering diet to increase immune response while maintaining growth(assumed more expensive)
2c. Giving cattle more room, keeping in smaller herds, lower disease transmission rates.
I don't read AC A human right
I don't understand the phrase 'automated design process'? why don't we use that same process to write code?
If we could have code as elegant as the cell , dna , etc that would be awesome.
This is not a bad example of the superstitious fallacy that market forces fix everything, and we should deregulate all markets because regulations only get in the way, blah blah blah. Feedlots exist because in the short term they are by far most efficient from the strict standpoint of profitability. They are monstrously inefficient overall because they externalize the costs of waste disposal, coliform contamination of meat, feed costs (corn, the favorite animal feed, is subsidized), high fat-content in the resulting meat (due to the use of corn instead of forage), etc. The public must bear these costs so that meat producers can enjoy a profitable business. The power of the market is largely a myth that exists mainly in academic discussions rather than in real life.
If you really want motivation to switch to grass-fed beef, do a little research into commercial meat farming. It's terrifying.
I'm willing to bet that most people would give up meat altogether if they ever saw the truth of its origins, let alone had to do the work themselves. It's utterly pathetic just how far removed people are from the process of their own food. They don't think of beef as "cow" or pork as "pig"... they're products, not animals. Of course, that's only a problem for people that go to the grocery store. I'm willing to bet that more people than not can't even do that much, and instead waste tons of money (as well as health and happiness) eating out all of the time.
"He who can destroy a thing, controls a thing." --Paul Atreides, Dune
...the uncontrolled experiment in microbe evolution being conducted in workplaces all over North America. In my own workplace there are these sanitation stations on every floor, in every wing, that dispense alcohol gel. Thousands of people everyday, in my complex alone, depopulate the flora and fauna of their hands to let the evolutionary lottery pick new winners to see what develops. I truly fear for the future of humanity.
The big producers have less healthy lifestock, but they can make it at a fraction of the price. Even if customers were organic snobs (And, be honest, most people don't care) a lot of animal products end up used in processed food where their origin and even presence is rarely noticed. A shopper might check their pork pies for the coming Christmas are made from organic pork - but how many realise the pastry contains milk and eggs, and the whole thing is probably held together with beef fat?
It seems to me that the only animal population that is out of control is the human animal... Maybe we should think about initiating an open season on that to take care of your meat needs?
"He who can destroy a thing, controls a thing." --Paul Atreides, Dune
disclaimer, I raise some cattle
This whole scene with the huge feedlots is a ripoff for the consumer and the end user eater..and for us small farmers. We only have a hand full of big packers in the US. Small farmers are forced to sell their feeder cattle at auction, because it is SO difficult to market full size eatin cows locally. It's possible, but mostly it just sucks, almost impossible People just don't have full size freezers anymore where they can fit a "side" or half a cow. So, we are forced to sell the cows at a lower weight, typically around 500-600 lbs at auction, for a suck ass cheap price, so the very few corporate buyers get them and ship them to the feedlots where they are fattened up like you describe in medium rank conditions. They have basically a ripoff cartel that sets prices. We as small farmers don't make much at all, most of the loot is made upstream at the packers and then the shippers, then with the wall street speculators who make a *ton* for doing nothing at all except being leeches. That $8.99 1lb ribeye you are eating we got paid around a buck for...maybe
If more people would buy locally, we could change this. Our cows are grass fed and happy, plenty of room to move around, shade, all of that. What happens after the auction is out of our hands. You as consumers can change this, buy local, spend the money and get a decent sized freezer, you will get much cheaper beef and better quality.
Cows are partially designed. Many domesticated species differ greatly from their wild ancestors. Cows included. Chickens too. Pigs a little, but not so much. Bananas are an extreme example.
Mixing and random mutation of genetic code can cause beneficial outcomes. Mixing and random mutation of machine code merely causes things to break.
I think it's fair to say that cows are both evolved and designed. Their basic makeup (including digestive system) is evolved, but the domesticated cow is the product of selective breeding and is a long way from the auroch from which it was derived.
As a veterinarian who works with food animals, blaming food producers for antibiotic resistance really irks me. Don't get me wrong, there are plenty of farmers out there who should not be allowed near animals. However, lots of people (including some of my colleagues) think banning antibiotic use in animals decreases the risk of "superbugs." I have an idea--instead of thinking this, let's look at a real world situation. Denmark instituted this exact ban several years ago. Did it help? NO! There's actually a possibility it might be increasing antibiotic resistance. Why? Feed additive antibiotics are almost all completely different class of medications from therapeutic antibiotics. There is not cross-over resistance problems. But many therapeutic antibiotics are used in animals and people, so that can cause cross-over resistance. Another question: does the antibiotic cause increased growth? Or are the animals suffering sub-clinical diseases that retard their growth, and we're just not smart enough to detect. In that case, they truly need the antibiotic because not giving it would force them to suffer from disease.
I'd much rather see the bad farmers run out of business than have government or a raging mob dictate how I treat patients.
However, I was reading that there is a new class of antibiotics in development, which are based on immune system antigens and, for some reason (anyone know more?) are thought to, because of their mechanism of action, not be susceptible to the same problem of evolving the bacteria to survive them.
I liked what the Russians were working on for a while - Phages. More completely, Bacteriophages. Viruses for bacterias.
No chance of the virus crossing over to affect humans, and a bacterial colony already under assault by the human immune system isn't generally going to last long when it's also 'sick' with a virus. As a bonus, immunity doesn't really happen because the virus adapts right along with the bacteria.
The problem with phages is that they're the opposite of broad-spectrum antibiotics. They're very, very, specific. They'll clear a throat infection right up, but first you need a culture to determine which species of bacteria you have(there's millions/billions of them), then find an effective phage against it.
That can take a week, then you gotta get the phage to the clinic, as most don't have the room for the number of phage samples you'd need.
I don't read AC A human right
No, genetic programming works great, especially if you:
1) allow the expression mechanism ("programming language") itself to evolve to work better in a selection environment
2) have millions of years
- For the complete works of Shakespeare: cat
The weak are the isolated populations that were specialised to conquer the illnesses that the greater populaion had not encountered yet and vis-versa.
The problem with infectious diseases and pathogens today is the same of the political atmosphere imposed by government: we are be violated by one-another unnecessarily by COERCED AND COMPELLED ASSOCIATION. If peopele were kept isolated, then no harm would spread and we can focus on properly regulating our innoculations of matter to train our immune systems in a scientific method.
Including chicken litter, which may include undigested chicken feed, which includes mammal tissues. Producers voluntarily stopped using chicken litter as cattle feed recently, but could go back to using it at any time.
That is completely wrong.
Read up on it.
Antibiotics make cows grow faster. They aren't sure why but it is a real effect and has nothing to do with keeping them disease-free.
- For the complete works of Shakespeare: cat
is the International Business Times an authority on anything. I'd never even heard from them before today.
/. fell for it.
Additionally, as someone with a doctorate in animal science and a researcher in the field, I have to say that the case against animal agriculture is overstated. No one will argue that they don't contribute, but the relative importance of antibiotic use in animals (that less than 1% of the population ever come into contact with while they are alive) relative to that of rampant, large-dose, antibiotic abuses in hospitals (You know where all of those sick people hang out, transferring infections back and forth) has never been ascertained empirically.
First, the vast majority of the bacterial species that live in livestock are not capable of living in people. Therefore, the rate of resistance transfer from animal bacteria to human bacteria is relatively low. Evidence exists that these species can, and do transfer resistance gene between eachother. However, the majority of the evidence is "Resistance gene A is present in pig bacteria and human bacteria, and genes are essentially identical, therefore the gene came from animals!" This of course, completely ignores the possiblity that the gene arose to prominence in the human population and then was transferred to a pig via a farm worker that was a carrier. Talk about placing the cart in front of horse.
Second, low levels of antibiotic use in the swine industry is usually only during the first month after weaning. Pigs are weaned at between 18 and 24 days on most farms in order to prevent the sow (aka "Mom") from transmitting certain diseases to the piglets that have little effect on adult animals, but can kill piglets very easily. At this age the maternal antibodies from the colostrum are starting to wear off, but the piglets own acquired immune system is not completely up to the task. Therefore the antibiotics buy the piglets time by reducing the overall microbial load in the intestine, and coincidentally increasing the efficiency of feed utilization (which is good for the environment). Many farms then discontinue the use of prophylactic, or growth promoting antibiotics because antibiotics cost money and feed costs can account for 60-70% of total production overhead. Expensive feed can drive you out of business in a hurry.
Third, to all those bragging about being from the EU, where there is a total ban on prophylactic antibiotics a word of caution. The total amount of antibiotics used in EU agriculture is not actually lower than it was before the ban. The difference is that instead of giving antibiotics to prevent infection, and improve production they are now given to tread disease outbreaks that wouldn't of otherwise happened and to try and minimize reductions in production. Also, the antibiotics of most relevance to human medicine are not routinely used for growth promotion, but they are used to treat disease outbreaks. So, the total tonnage of antibiotics being administered has not really gone down (it did until they banned them in the nursery which was the last phase of the ban), and the antibiotics being used are MORE likely to also be used in human medicine. Bravo, talk about unintended consequences!
Finally, I fail to see how this made the front page here. It is not the usual fare of geek (no computers anywhere), it is not actually news (this controversy has been around for at least a decade), this article contributed nothing new to the discussion (restates already rampant FUD), and the IBTimes are not exactly the NYTimes or LATimes. The only thing I can see in its favor is that it lets the ignorant "Organic" group say I told you so without any real technical points for those few of us in the field to respond to. The original article is link-bait, plain and simple and
Pathetic
Bureaucracy expands to meet the needs of the expanding bureaucracy.-Oscar Wilde
It needs to be used. Not only for the well being of animals everywhere, but for reasons such as this (if it would solve it, at least).
why don't we use that same process to write code?
Because the end result would be random. In order to get code which performs a particular function, you'd have to carefully define the selection criteria, which would be just as complex as writing the damn code yourself.
On the other hand, we ARE using genetic algorithms to create optimized solutions for projects where it can actually help. For instance, IIRC the Japanese used it to develop an optimized folding pattern for the solar-sail on the last spacecraft they launched. If what you're looking for is simple to define then genetic algorithms work great; otherwise, not so much.
If we could have code as elegant as the cell , dna , etc that would be awesome
Given that most of our DNA serves no useful function, and considering all the viruses which we're constantly being infected by, I wouldn't exactly call it elegant. We're like the Windows ME of biological systems. Natural selection has done some amazing things over the last billion years, but give us a few hundred more to figure things out and we'll be able to do a hell of a lot better.
I think you wrong. I buy pork from the Amish and Mennonite, if they get sick they are put down. If I need to save money I do the pig in and gut it myself. The butcher packs it for me. If I could do the same with beef I would, but I do not have the freezer room for a side or quarter. I am thus forced to purchase grass fed south american beef.
2) Some farmers let you just buy a side of a cow (or an entire cow).
...And the scary thing is, somewhere on my bookshelves, I have a '70s American book that tells you how to build a barbeque that will cook two whole steers in one go. I've just never been that hungry... :-}
The little town I live in has a cattle feed lot outside of town (brilliantly placed downwind). The inevitable stench is commonly referred to as "The Smell of Other Peoples Money".
As an added bonus; occasionally when they feed the cattle, a cloud of dust rolls into town like of fog. Of course it's not just dirt, but also tiny particles of animal feed - and dried fecal matter. But being the second largest employer in a rural county, nothing will ever be done about this. This is also the same state (one of many, I bet) that has no problem allowing cattle to graze (and defecate) in occasionally dry stream beds.
Pork fat, pastry is made with lard. Not tallow. That would be horrible.
Oh and stop using Crisco, that stuff sucks. Mix butter and lard 50/50 if you must.
hahaha Food inc. gah, what a horrid mess of logical fallacious half truths and fear mongering.
It's a horrible place to get 'facts' about our food system
maybe you should get started by actually looking into studies and specifics.
Even though Climate change is real and severely being impacted by humans, I wouldn't want someones opinion to be based soley on Al Gores movie.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
You forgot option 3:
Stop eating the cows altogether.
Before I get modded troll, please know that despite my username, i'm not pushing an agenda. Just pointing out that that is one possible option.
And yes, I realize they're made of meat, so we're supposed to eat them, etc.
Mother nature isn't a person or a thing. Quit anthropomorphizing reality. It's really fucking annoying, and makes you look like an idiot.
Well Mr. Frumbles, how do you propose I phrase what I wanted to say? If there's a way to get the concept across that appeals to the 1% of the population who don't understand what I mean by "mother nature", I'm all ears.
Now, should I go ahead and generalize your childish attitude to everyone who is "opposed" to organic farming and the concept of all-natural food products? Of course, that wouldn't be fair.
Finally, are you that angered at the prospect of somebody refusing to abide by your own lifestyle choices? Perhaps you need a hobby, say, synthetic preservative research and development?
Corn is a species of grass.A big, tall species of grass that produces lots of big seeds, but it's still a grass.
WRONG. There would be NO ANIMAL FARMS. What use are pigs, cows, or chickens if not for food. Losing these genetic freaks would also help reduce the green house effect and free up precious farm land for agriculture.
Their design by evolution... stop being fucking pedantic you know what he meant.
Their [sic] design [sic] by evolution... ya know what I mean?
Look where all this talking got us, baby.
Got a link or a cite for that? I'd like to read up on it.
My past reading on the subject said that when cattle were dosed with non-therapeutic levels of antibiotics that (1) they grew faster and (2) they suffered from fewer bacterial infections. It's not clear that (1) follows from (2), but it sure makes a lot of sense. IIRC, the unanswered question was how the supposedly non-therapeutic levels of antibiotics prevent illness.
"Trolls they were, but filled with the evil will of their master: a fell race..." -- J.R.R. Tolkien on Olog-hai
Well, unfortunately, the family farmer who raises livestock is pretty much controlled by the corporations that contract the animals to him/her.
On the flip side, there are some farmers who are prepared to raise livestock with the long term in mind. (I've had very good results with local agricultural colleges.) I am a specialist cheesemaker, and am prepared to pay above the bulk rate for milk from cattle that have been properly looked after. I just build the cost ino the final price of my product (which is not cheap, but it sells).
I get to exert my own geekery by selection of cocktails of bugs to ferment and mature my products.
THIS!
I (we) buy all of our food directly from farms. We live in a suburb of New York City, and still we have found farms not too far away.
We buy a 1/4 cow (we split it with three other families) and it feeds us for a year. All of our produce comes from farms as well.
Our beef and chicken is raised walking around eating grass and bugs and whatever it would naturally eat.
The food tastes better and is better for us.
A month doesn't go by that I don't hear of some horrible contamination-caused food recall that doesn't affect me or my family.
- For the complete works of Shakespeare: cat
Genetic programming works great if you a looking for a 'close enough' result. Things like machine intelligence and control systems lend themselves to such evolution, as you can change various constraints, tweak an algorithm, to get a similar, but not exactly the same, result. It can respond slightly faster, or be slightly more accurate, and your fitness test will select from that.
The problem is that our current programming paradigm requires exactness. It either works or it doesn't, and there is no gray area in between to select within. We have no idea how to program something which could allow that.
someone should mod you up, this post is informative and insightful
crisco sucks, butter rules !!!
Jehovah be praised, Oracle was not selected
Here's one-- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JJ--faib7to
the debeaker machine is for the chickens they keep
the grinder is for all the unwanted males.
mind you, I find turkey tasty.. but I do think this stuff is pretty cruel
http://www.mercyforanimals.org/hor/
I'm not a rabid animal rights dude, and I will keep eating... but yeah, what I see is nasty...
every day http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
so stop buying the cheapest meat as possible
Jehovah be praised, Oracle was not selected
We are both partially right. From http://www.fao.org/docrep/article/agrippa/555_en.htm
According to the National Office of Animal Health (NOAH, 2001), antibiotic growth promoters are used to "help growing animals digest their food more efficiently, get maximum benefit from it and allow them to develop into strong and healthy individuals". Although the mechanism underpinning their action is unclear, t is believed that the antibiotics suppress sensitive populations of bacteria in the intestines. It has been estimated that as much as 6 per cent of the net energy in the pig diet could be lost due to microbial fermentation in the intestine (Jensen, 1998). If the microbial population could be better controlled, it is possible that the lost energy could be diverted to growth.
Thomke & Elwinger (1998) hypothesize that cytokines released during the immune response may also stimulate the release of catabolic hormones, which would reduce muscle mass. Therefore a reduction in gastrointestinal infections would result in the subsequent increase in muscle weight. Whatever the mechanism of action, the result of the use of growth promoters is an improvement in daily growth rates between 1 and 10 per cent resulting in meat of a better quality, with less fat and increased protein content. There can be no doubt that growth promoters are effective; Prescott & Baggot (1993), however, sho ed that the effects of growth promoters were much more noticeable in sick animals and those housed in cramped, unhygienic conditions.
Currently, there is controversy surrounding the use of growth promoters for animals destined for meat production, as overuse of any antibiotic over a period of time may lead to the local bacterial populations becoming resistant to the antibiotic. This is it not an invariable rule: Streptococcus pyogenes remains sensitive to penicillins after over sixty years of clinical use but such examples are, however, very rare. Undoubtedly, the medical exploitation of antimicrobial chemotherapy, particularly to treat human infections, has imposed an enormous selection pressure on formerly sensitive bacteria to acquire genetic elements that code for resistance to antibiotics.
- For the complete works of Shakespeare: cat
While I will agree that this practice of putting ANY low dose antibiotic in livestock feed is rank stupidity (as it would become ineffective in a few years) does anyone know if the antibiotics used in these feeds are actually used in humans anymore? I can just see all of this controversy over an antibiotic that hasn't been used in humans for 50 years and would have no effect on human disease resistance.
I bet he got a roughly equal number of 'insightful' and 'funny' mods. I laughed at first when I read it.
Dear Slashdot: next time you want to mess with the site, add a rich-text editor for comments.
> The reason it increases their size is because it keeps them disease-free.
No. The conditions instituted to increase efficiency of the farm, increase their size and the nature of their composition (e.g., marbling) encourage disease; the antibiotics are present to offset these consequences.
I thought not reading the summary was lazy. You, sir, amaze me- you don't even read the title of your own comment.
My webcomic
Here in Australia we don't (usually) feed cattle on corn, but the protein yield from corn would be much higher than that of grass, which would (other things being equal) lead to a a much faster growth rate.
Some of the fault must be applied to all of us. Every time we get the sniffles, we run to the doctor's office and antibiotics are prescribed even though they do not toucn the cold or flue virus.
You do realize that I was speaking in context of the cattle farmer's options, right?
Haven't had cow in quite a while, personally. Just finishing off the last of the doe I got last year.
And yeah, I'd say you're pushing your agenda, just not as meanly as some might.
Of course, I'm also not the typical vegan target, as they can't disgust me with the practices of stockhouses. I've killed, gutted, slaughtered, and cooked my own meat.
I don't read AC A human right
Thanks, I enjoyed your comment and the cite.
"Trolls they were, but filled with the evil will of their master: a fell race..." -- J.R.R. Tolkien on Olog-hai
You sound like a reputable source for what is most nutritional for a cow.
I'm vegetarian (for health reasons, not for ideology) and this is the funniest post I've read today. Kudos, sir. :)
Karma: Excellent, but still won't get you laid.
You do realize that I was speaking in context of the cattle farmer's options, right?
Mine was also a viable option for the cattle farmer. Would take a paradigm shift, perhaps, but buggy whips, etc.
And yeah, I'd say you're pushing your agenda, just not as meanly as some might.
Fair enough. Taking the opportunity to push my agenda by contributing to the conversation in an on topic way? I'll accept that.
I've killed, gutted, slaughtered, and cooked my own meat.
I actually find less at fault about that than farm raised, corn fed meat. Kudos for knowing what goes into it.
There is a trend lately in medical circles and especially the media to blame every infection on viruses when in fact it seems to me (from experience) that bacteria are much more troublesome. I have no idea why this obsession with just viruses but the media (in particular) need to be reminded that bacteria (not even "superbugs", just plain "old" bacteria) and even fungi are DEADLY too. I am quite disgusted at the amount of money and effort that went into the H1N1 panic when these resources could have been put to better use researching new antibiotics and phages.
I grew up on a farm. There is a reason "corn fed" is a popular colloquialism meaning "big and strong." Growing cattle for beef is very (biologically) inefficient, especially on grass. Corn-fed animals grow larger, faster, on less land = more profit. So, if you want to eat beef, you can't expect a farmer to practice farming techniques like "grass fed on the open range" when "corn-fed on a farm" is so much more efficient and profitable. Example: Montana cattle. They are largely raised on huge ranches, allowed to graze on grass. And they are small and stringy compared to fatty, delicious, corn-fed beef.
Besides, the issue isn't diet. The issue is animal health and cleanliness. No bacterium is immune to a bleach cleaning routine, and bacterial populations wouldn't evolve if quarantines were properly implemented for sick animals.
The reason it increases their size is because it keeps them disease-free.
Also, it allows the farmer to cram the cow full of corn (increasing its size,) which will kill the cow unless it gets a constant stream of antibiotics along with it.
The libertarian solution to the failures of capitalism is to apply more capitalism til the failures are fixed.
Design presumes that there is some kind of plan or intent behind the entire process. Evolution is a naturalistic process based on probability.
That which does not kill me may cripple me and seldom if ever will make me stronger.
Free Martian Whores!
A decent chest freezer isn't too costly, especially in comparison to the amount you'd surely save in the long run.
Your chosen path is admirable, but far from the norm that I spoke of. You must be more aware of that than anyone, though.
"He who can destroy a thing, controls a thing." --Paul Atreides, Dune
Grass/Corn debate is crap
Grass-fed does taste better, tho.
The libertarian solution to the failures of capitalism is to apply more capitalism til the failures are fixed.
If we could have code as elegant as the cell , dna , etc that would be awesome.
Except for that part where it isn't elegant at all. It's a huge mishmash of "works well enough", "let's see what fucking around with this variable does", and isn't human readable in the least. Most of it doesn't even appear to do anything at all. It's prone to defects and security holes abound. Hell, it even looks like there's planned obsolescence after the next generation gets going.
Some people have used a similar process to write code, but it isn't suitable for most problems.
I will NOT be told what to eat. For every bucket of fried chicken assholes like you DON'T eat, I'll eat three, plus a package of Wal-mart bacon. In summary, fuck you and the PETA horse you didn't ride in on.
GM animals are not to my knowledge on the market anywhere in the US or Europe. The only GM animal I know of that is even under consideration is a Canadian strain of pig with a phytase gene from the mold Aspergillus niger expressed in the saliva so as to enable the pig to utilize dietary phosphorus with almost complete efficiency. The pig has not yet been approved, and even after it is, it won't reach very many kitchen tables for a long time. The strain of pigs has been isolated from all of the genetic improvements made in swine since it's initial creation. While it may digest Phosphorus almost completely, it is not commercially competitive due to the lower performance relative to un-modified commercial pig lines. They'll have to cross them with faster growing animals to become competitive. They will also most likely be incredibly expensive for farmers to buy, either gilts or semen due to their high cost of development and limited population. I know of no other GM animals that are being considered for approval, never mind any that are already approved. Have you come across some that I've missed? I did my MS in phosphorus nutrition, so I came across these pigs 8 years ago or so during my lit review, but it's possible there are other GM pigs that I'm unaware of outside of my discipline.
As to the value of this particular GM. The modification can only be considered beneficial. The primary storage form of P in plants is phytic acid, in which 6 P molecules are attached to a benzene ring. This form of P is virtually indigestibly by non-ruminant animals (pigs, chickens, ducks, turkeys, horses, humans, etc.) so rock phosphates are added to bring the digestible P content of the feed up to the animals requirement. This frequently doubles the total P content of the feed, with the undigested P ending up in the manure and potentially in local surface and ground water. The phytase enzyme secreted in the saliva of these GM pigs can degrade phytic acid, rendering all of the P in the diet digestible. This results in a dramatic reduction in P excretion and virtually eliminates the need for non-renewable rock phosphates in pig diets. I for one would love to eat this particular GM pig due to the importance of P balance on the environment.
Organic production prohibits not only the use of such useful strain of pigs, but it also prohibits the use of in-feed enzymes such as the commercially available phytase enzyme preparations. They don't liberate 100% of the P like the GM pigs, but they can increase P digestibility cost effectively enough that they are cheaper than rock-phosphates. Don't even get me started on the other inefficiencies that are required for organic production and are a net negative on the environment and welfare of the pig.
Organic is an idea that is filled with emotional meaning, and almost none of it's restrictions are actually good for consumers, the environment, or the animals. I'm always amazed at how many "Greenies" support the inherently inefficient Organic movement as if they were remotely compatible with each other. Green requires maximal efficiency to minimize waste and environmental impact. Organic severely, and arbitrarily, limits efficiency for an intangible idea about "the good old days" and is a tax on the well meaning, but ignorant wealthy.
P.S. Super-bugs are only a problem for someone with a compromised immune system. Neither the acquired or innate immune systems use antibiotics to fight infection, so the superbugs are just as susceptible to those systems as their non-resistant peers. Doesn't help if your 90 year old Grandmother gets MRSA, but the majority of the population is healthy enough to clear it without even noticing they were infected.
Bureaucracy expands to meet the needs of the expanding bureaucracy.-Oscar Wilde
Let's start with you! And yes, I'll be modded down for this even though you weren't.
Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
bwaaa?
For, like, accounting programs and business apps, sure. And GA/GP would be a real bad idea for things like that. But if you need a better weather predictor, or a better fluid mechanics simulator, or a better algorithm for playing the stock market, then genetic programming could work. And HAS worked, as people have used this process to get better designs. Or, if you don't know what you're doing, a massive waste of time and money.
And, uh, it doesn't take millions of years, it takes millions of generations, which happen about as fast as your computer can crunch numbers. Which is pretty fast now a days.
that depends upon your purpose. cows are not pets. they are grown for food. so we should feed them what makes them more tasty, not more healthy.
Although I would agree that we should only feed animals feed that evolution has designed them to eat, what they eat has little or nothing to do with bacteriological disease. The bacteriological and viral diseases are there because the animals are penned up in much closer proximity than thay are evolved for.
It was relatively recently that the gigantofarms with thousands of head of livestock were penned up together. In my grandfather's day a few hundred head was a big ranch, and they grazed in open fields.
I'd also say it's perfectly OK to feed corn to pork; pigs are omnivores, like us and vultures, and can live on damned near anything. Horses and cows, otoh, should be fed hay. Dogs and cats and other carnivores should be fed meat. For a carnivore or an omnivore, the type of meat doesn't really matter (although cats REALLY like fish).
Free Martian Whores!
Mine was also a viable option for the cattle farmer. Would take a paradigm shift, perhaps, but buggy whips, etc.
As long as the economics are still there, you'll still have cattle farmers. Something like this that raises the cost of meat a bit, perhaps reduces consumption a bit would likely result in somewhat fewer ranchers.
There are still a few buggy whip makers out there. The paradigm shift you're looking at would be something more like being abot to produce TRUE factory meat without actually needing a cow via cloning or artificial growth culture or whatever.
I actually find less at fault about that than farm raised, corn fed meat. Kudos for knowing what goes into it.
Heh, last wild turkey I ate probably ate more corn on the farm where it grew up than what the domestic varieties get. Farmer liked us hunting there because they were eating his crops.
I'll note that there are other posts in this thread that point out that Europe is actually having more superbug problems despite having already banned the practice, even come up with a falsifiable theory - basically low level usage doesn't help create superbugs as much as theraputic doses, and by not low-dosing they end up theraputic dosing near the same raw amount of antibiotics into actual sick animals.
Sounds like an interesting theory. It could be that low doses of antibiotics don't grant immunity like the massive theraputic doses do. My idea was that, while the low dose harms bacteria, it doesn't harm it enough to compensate for the the lowered efficiency of shutting down or modifying a metabolic path in order to be resistant. Then the critter's immune system does the rest.
I don't read AC A human right
Heh, I'm from Marietta, GA. My roommate bought a registered pit bull
Why is it that those two statements really do seem to go together?
Feeding them the correct food, giving them room to roam away from each other and from their waste or cleaning their living areas continually, identifying and isolating the sick ones quicker, all do cost more.
At current prices most producers would quit. Supply drops, prices go up, demand drops, equilibrium is reached, and we move on with less meat in our diets or pay more for it. It's a sort of tax vs. current status quo.
The alternative is to give medicine to the animals to avoid all that and still get the meat to the market. Supply is maintained, prices remain (relatively) low.
But then we get superbugs, get sick, have to spend money on medicine for us, lose income to illness, and/or die. It's a sort of tax vs. the current status quo.
Anyone who wants a bill against use of drugs that create superbugs in the food chain needs to be making this sort of argument: we're going to pay for it one way or the other; we can can choose between a more expensive sandwich, or death.
And they need to make sure that the voters in their district know that the person opposing them is choosing to kill people to make an agricorporation another.
* - Some people would think that's a good thing; I happen not to be one of them, but that's not the point here. Pass the veal.
My philosophy on meat is quite simple. I only eat wild meat. That basically limits me to vegetarian when I eat out (which is cheaper and healthier) and limits the total amount of meat I can afford to eat when cooking at home. (Wild meat isn't always easy to get, and it is usually more expensive than farm raised meats - unless you are a hunter I guess, but even then you have to spend quite a bit of money on equipment to hunt and freezers/electricity to store excess, so it's not free or even cheap).
Since I changed my ways (strangely, the video of Sarah Palin going on about saving a turkey while one is beheaded in the background was the turning point for me, I'm not sure if it was Mrs. Palin or the poor turkey) I've lost 35 lbs and my cholesterol is now normal. Exercise has not changed, 6'4" tall and now weigh a very healthy 188lbs with 10% body fat.
Even better, feed them the food they have EVOLVED to eat.
Gawd, not this/i unimaginative debate again. Why can't it be both; why the simplistic insistence that these concepts remain mutually exclusive? Evolution can't be denied (we've observed it in action, time and again) but why can't a "Universal Awareness" (I dislike the word "God," to me it sounds so ass-backward and presumptuous) have used "evolution" to influence "design?"
Huh?
First, we need to reduce the amount of meat we consume, and we need to consume better meat when we do.
Uh, why reduce meat intake? You never really explain that part.
"Better" meat? There are the good cuts and the bad cuts. If you had said we need to eat healthier food, or even just eat less, then oh yeah, I'd totally agree. But better meat? Chuck roast or pigs feet is just as healthy as T-bone. You only get so much t-bone out of a cow and that comes along with a certain amount of rump.
This diet that America has of eating a big bucket of meat and cheese from Denny's is just ridiculous, and it's killing us on multiple fronts.
Yes, the "big" modifier in there is making us fat. And, arguably, the fact that it's from Denny's. But eating meat and cheese is not the problem here.
Eating smaller portions of meat,
Again, eating smaller portions is what's needed. But I'm still not seeing why you're blaming the meat. Eating a bucket of pasta is equally unhealthy.
Factory farming has got to go, it's horrible on so many fronts. I'm not a foodie, and I don't have vegan super powers, and I recognize that people are on a budget, and can't shop for organic at whole foods (hell, I can't afford to, and I have a decent job). But we have to figure some kind of practical way forward, because we can't keep packing animals in to dark crates, standing in their own filth and pumping them full of drugs and then call that dinner.
Ah! Here we go.
1)"meat is expensive, good meat doubly so". This is true. Livestock simply has additional costs. And we pay for the flavor. The delicious juicy flavor. The good parts of the livestock really are that much more expensive. But hey, it's our money to spend.
2)"animal cruelty is bad". Meh. They're animals. I'm not a fan of animal cruelty, but their lives will not be glamorous. There will always be the bleeding hearts who will never be happy with any form of livestock, here and now, farms aren't all that bad. "dark crates"? meh. "standing in own filth"? Yeah, pig pens are dirty. It's really only cruelty if it leads to disease. (which, in sudden burst of on-topicness really could lead to cleaner livestock practices if superbugs become a big issue).
3)"Pumped full of drugs" Like antibiotics to keep them healthy? Or you're probably talking about hormones to make them fatten up. Yeah, that's been debated. There might be an issue where those hormones are seeping into the human populous, maybe. But chemicals and drugs are not evil. "Natural" is not synonymous with "healthy" or even "good". Snake venom will kill you just as easily as cyanide, and nature really only plans to keep you around till your kid can start hunting.
So, while your post ran parallel to a few good ideas, you didn't really take it in a good direction. Blaming meat where there is no reason to blame it simply dilutes your whole argument, and the argument for dietitians everywhere. You're the reason that there are those old republicans who spew nonsense about the damned hippies taking away the meat from the grocery store. Either point out the real negatives to the livestock industry, or tell the fatties to stop eating so damn much.
You know what else works?
Bacon.
It's the other way. When you feed them corn, you can keep them in close quarters where filth and disease can spread easily.
When you feed them grass, by letting them graze on a pasture, you have to give them more room, which reduces the concentration of filth and disease.
Also having them more spread out and moving around makes it easier to detect ill cattle and treat them individually.
Actually, this has been at times a challenge with sacred cows in India.
And disease is a problem because they're packed like sardines into a feedlot eating food which weakens their resistance to infection...
This can go round and round endlessly. In the end it comes down to this: we'd probably be better off buying grass fed beef (for that fat content and profile if nothing else), but that would cost more and it would taste different from what we're used to, so it will never happen.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
"Some Virii are MORE EQUAL than others!"
"Flyin' in just a sweet place,
Never been known to fail..."
Troll? What is the relationship between cows eating grass and not needing antibiotics. Dairy cows are given antibiotics to treat mastitis. That probably is 90% of antibiotic use on a dairy farm. Unless you are talking Monensin?
Actually, corn-fed cows have much better tasting steak.
wake up and hold your nose
Far better is to start a rumor that the extra weight is antibiotic resistant superbugs, anyways what happens to the livestock that are left to deal with superbugs? Do we give them antibiotics? Cheap low-grade antibiotics? Super-antibiotics that we use on people to get rid of superbugs? How do we deal with the inevitable larger quantities of superbugs?
Under the influence of Post-Cyberpunk Gonzo Journalism
Most of the 'specification' consists of adding 'in the following environment:' and then a lot of information about the neighborhood.
That's not how survival of the fittest works though. ;)
"He who can destroy a thing, controls a thing." --Paul Atreides, Dune
>
I'm willing to bet that most people would give up meat altogether if they ever saw the truth of its origins, let alone had to do the work themselves.
Same thing with laws, sausages and civilization. Do you have the courage of your convictions?
Set your phasers on "funky"!
... can leave me horribly maimed for the rest of my life!
You'd still have to pump them full of antibiotics. The environment they are in tends to be pretty bad due to trying to pack as many animals together as possible to increase profit by lowering costs.
Doubtless having animals eat the kinds of food they should actually be eating would help the situation some, though, as it would remove some of the needs for antibiotics and artificial diet balancers.
This applies to humans as well.
Set your phasers on "funky"!
Antibiotic abuse is necessary to keep costs down. Factory farms crowd animals together which spreads disease ( i.e. swine flu, avian flue ), so they need antibiotics.
I'm not sure most people would be willing to pay the much higher costs necessary to raise animals.
The upside is that eating less meat is extremely helpful to the environment. For example, if you could get most Americans to avoid meat one day a week it would have the same benefit as removing 100,000 cars from the road. On a personal level, giving up meat for one day a week is more effective at reducing your personal footprint than buying all of your food locally.
There is a global movement for this easy habit. Google on "Meatless Monday".
If you would like to do more than one day you can go to this site to learn all of the benefits and how to get a start:
http://wwww.tryveg.com/
I wish I could mod this up.
Putting many living things togeter in the same space is what fosters disease. It is why children always come home from school with colds and other things.
It is why factory farms spread the avian flu and the swine flu
"Evolution is an automated design process with a more complete specification than manual engineering."
Err... is that a new way to say "intelligent design"?
I wish I could mod this up.
"Someone is bound to say something like; No, No, No, the dollar is god [...] yes feed them grass and I don't care about your stank profits"
Why do you think there's any difference?
I bet you that those congressmen that won't let pass an antibiotic-free meat bill because they follow the money god will buy for themselves high quality grass-fed beef. ...And they can do it because they have the money, so their faith shows to hold merit!
Um, the hole in the ozone layer was legislated away (or in that direction at least). It's one of the success stories of green legislation.
"We live in a suburb of New York City [...] Our beef and chicken is raised walking around eating grass and bugs"
And pesticides, and heavy metals, and policyclic aromatic hydrocarbures. But, hey, if that makes you feel better...
The plant itself is, but feeding "corn" to cattle differs from feeding "grass" to cattle because "corn-fed" cattle are fed a diet high in the grain of the corn, while "grass-fed" (or "pasture-fed") cattle eat largely whole grass plants, of which a very small portion is the grain (also, corn has been selectively cultivated for a very long time to produce more and different grain from the grasses from which it originated.)
Go in with a few other families and purchase a cow or pig at your local county fair. They're hand-raised by 4H kids and sold at auction once a year. Since the kids are both judged and make more money based on the health and appearance of the animal it behooves them (aha ha) to make sure it gets plenty of exercise and attention.
It's fantastic food, you're supporting a local seller, and you can see exactly where your money is going. 1/3 of a pig or 1/4 of a cow will last a family a long time.
Literalism isn't a form of humor, it's you being irritating.
It's not only the beta lactams that you mention. The quinolones and sulfanamides are going away, too, in a blaze of resistance. The aminoglycosides are either relatively weak or (again) facing resistance issues. The only class of antibiotic drugs that aren't suffering as much from resistance issues are the oxazolidinones and that's only because (a) they haven't been around that long, (b) they are generally only effective against gram-positive strains of bacteria, and (c) they have relatively poor side effects. And there's only one of those approved for labeled use as an antibiotic.
As for your magic bullet of genome sequencing for drug design, I'm afraid you've probably only read layperson level, breathless press releases about it. I'm sure we'll have new antibiotics from that path about the same time we get large scale fusion reactors working to generate significant amounts of power. There's a hell of a lot of work between understanding attack vectors (which is what genome sequencing gives you *part* of - for the rest of the picture you need protein folding and large-scale chemical simulation... and don't forget solvation issues in the latter) and getting an actual working drug into production.
That is all.
it's so funny to watch you guys argue over causes/effects/procedures/laws regarding this stuff. people and companies are going to do what makes them the most money the quickest. if you think that is ever going away, you should kill yourself now. plenty of people acknowledge that they eat genetically modified corn, or hormone-injected beef. your job as a person is to make the best informed decisions for yourself, not sit here and bitch about the inevitable consequence of what is going on here. stop whining, none of these procedures and advancements are going away.
If you want the benefits of a civilized society, you can't demand "survival of the fittest" to be your mantra. Civilization has laws.
Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
And what about free market? Why not let it decide what's best for everyone? :snark:
I said I live near New York City. I didn't say the farm is in the city. The farm is over a hundred miles from the city in rural farmland. They don't use pesticides and there is no heavy industry next to the farm.
If you are trying to make the point that ANY farm is polluted by the pesticides and heavy metals that are endemic to all of our air and water at this point, then that is no point at all. I am certainly getting LESS of those from family farm raised food than you are getting from eating factory farm food that is sprayed with pesticides directly.
- For the complete works of Shakespeare: cat
If the average person ate less meat - say just once or twice a fortnight - and used the savings to buy better, tastier meat - things like free range chicken, grass-fed beef, and more game meat - then not only would people be much healthier but demand for mass-produced meat would fall through the floor, making the sort of "meat factories" they're talking about in the article financially inviable. I believe it's called a win-win situation.
Heh.
But this is a great example of where we can use the Int.Design meme to admonish all those naughty Christian farmers that are not only directly opposing and insulting God by not feeding the animals what they were DESIGNED to eat, but clearly worshipping the false idol of Money in His place.
How dare they?
Fluroquinolines (such as ciprofloxacin) are used to treat Campylobacter infection, a disease which effects 1.4 million people in the United States each year and is contracted from eating undercooked chicken amongst other things. Flouroquinolines (such as enrofloxacin) also started being used in veterinary medicine, where their use led in the number of Camblobacter infections being antibiotic resistant going from 0% in 1992 to 41% in 2001. Based on this, the FDA moved to ban the use of enroflaxacin in poultry. What happened? The manufacturer Bayer, and their trade group, the Animal Health Industry sued. This kept enrofloxacin on the market for a further 5 years, during which time I estimate there would have been an additional 19,000 Fluroquinoline treatment failures, and numerous deaths, in humans. [Nelson, Chiller, Powers, and Angulo, 2007]
And what of the farm industries beloved profits? Let's say the regulation of antibiotics in the agricultural sector increases the price of meat by 5%? Then what? The demand elasticity for beef, chicken and pork, have been estimated at -0.27 to -0.974 [Fiala, 2006]. In every case this is greater than -1.0. What this means is that a 1% increase in the price of meat would result in a less than 1% reduction in the amount of meat consumed. Thus the actual dollar volume, and with it the profits to the industry would actually increase, not decrease under an antibiotic regulation regime. Picking the mid-point -0.6, gives a 0.4 x 5% = 2% increase in the dollar volume of meat sold, or $3b a year for a $160b/year industry. Consumers win, farmers win, why hasn't this happened?
I do not have a place to put that. I live in an apartment. I guess it could go in the basement but then I would have to lock it.
How come so many people here are all for science except for when it comes to food. How about we just use natural building materials instead of ones that science and technology gave us? Why should people cook food? That alters the basic properties of the natural food. What if we can create food that is better than what is naturally out there?
My mother's side of the family still farms and raises cattle. We pay market price for the cow and the cost to process it. For a half a side of beef, after processing, about $2 lbs. All the stakes, hamburger, roasts, ... etc you can eat in a year for about $240. I split this with my parents. I get about 110 lbs for my stand up freezer. The beef is grass fed most of the time, but before slaughter, is fed corn. This gives the favor you get at the supermarket.
May I please have my frontal lobotomy if I bring back the ashtrays?
Well, you being a /. reader and all, there's a room you may not have noticed. It's that compartment in your bathroom that has a really high faucet coming out of the wall.
We buy a 1/4 cow (we split it with three other families) and it feeds us for a year. All of our produce comes from farms as well.
That's great, but think of the fast food industry. People are lazy, and want meal-sized portions already prepared for them in a vat of hot fat.
I don't see people ordering a SpicyCrispy1/4Cow to go. Err, maybe I spoke too soon.
I don't want a civilized society however. That's what got us her in the first place.
"Civilized men are more discourteous than savages because they know they can be impolite without having their skulls split, as a general thing."
—Robert E. Howard
"He who can destroy a thing, controls a thing." --Paul Atreides, Dune
So, sealing the hole in the ozone layer will
a) contribute to global warming, because it will re-establish a layer of greenhouse gasses that had previously gone missing.
b) contribute to global cooling because the greenhouse gasses protect us from being hit directly by solar radiation.
c) look, the hole in the ozone layer is fixed, global warming is unpossible!
Under the influence of Post-Cyberpunk Gonzo Journalism
My nephew raises grass fed, anti-biotic free (unless they are sick and the vet gives it to the sick cow) cows. Best frickin beef I have ever eaten, taste wise at least. The steaks are a little tough, IMNSHO, but the ground beef and roasts are very tasty. A. Brown says the corn feeding or corn fattened cows are done for two reasons, adding weight and homogenizing the taste. Anyway, I can take the ground beef from my nephew's cows, make a patty, and when I cook it on the grill, it is almost the exact same size after it cooks. Right now he is in the process of cross-breeding long horns into his herd.
I have killed and ate deer, squirrels, possum, rabbits, doves, and wild boar. I have also killed, plucked, gutted and cooked chickens, and helped in slaughtering hogs, which we then ate in many different ways. I think you are confusing the factory type farms and slaughter houses with actual old style raising and preparing meat for the table.
I'd say very little, if any to pigs. In just a generation or two, feral pigs look and act just like untouched wild pigs with tusks and all.
Just be sure the butcher you use (or the farmer uses) is good. A very healthy grass fed steer can end up tasting very gamey if butchered improperly.
I have a shower/tub and no way in hell would a chest freezer would fit in there.
But what they eat isn't designed, that's the part we are actively working on.
Gawd, not this/i unimaginative debate again. ... why can't a "Universal Awareness" (I dislike the word "God," to me it sounds so ass-backward and presumptuous) have used "evolution" to influence "design?"
Actually, in this case that's what people were talking about. Except the "design" wasn't done by a [Gg]od. It was done by a million local animal breeders over thousands of years, who started with a number of wild animals, and through selective breeding, produced the modern milk/egg/meat machines that give us most of our protein.
Similar selective breeding was done by other millions of growers to produce our modern grains, some of which are so different from their wild ancestors that we're not sure just which wild species were the ancestors.
However our domesticated animal and plant species came to be, we know a fair amount about how they turned into the current species. There was a good deal of "intelligent design" in this process. Urban stereotypes of dumb rural hicks aside, many of those millions of growers and breeders did know what they were doing and how they wanted their animals and crops to change.
Those who do study history are doomed to stand helplessly by while everyone else repeats it.
That and if you shoot them up with steroids they grow bigger and faster but it knocks down their immune systems.
Some say designed because they believe a deity actually designed them. Others as a sort of metaphor for the output of the worlds first and longest running genetic algorithm.
not a bacteriological one. Antibiotics will do absolutely nothng against a viral disease.
But antimicrobials do work against viruses, and they are overused as well.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
Know what's ironic? Dandelions are not native to the US. Scandinavians brought it as food, the leaves are used as greens for salad, the roots can be cooked, and the flowers are used to make dandelion wine.
Yet today most people treat them as a weed.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
As another Vegan, glad someone else has played "Defensive Omnivore Bingo" before :)
http://bit.ly/veganbingo
My advice, nod your head and pretend its the first time you've heard the remark, "oh, aren't you the witty one? I'll be off right now, for the first time in years to eat a dead animal corpse thanks to your input, kind sir!"
---
aw cmon, you were ONtopic!
Theres one solution to the issue of animal suffering in the world, not to regulate it, but to abolish the property status of Animals. 56 Billion land animals a year, ( UN FOA 2007 PDF http://bit.ly/56billion ), for what? Pleasure, and profit.
For more on Veganism, please visit http://www.abolitionistapproach.com/
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Good post.
haha - i got modded down!! I hardly ever post here (obviously) but i thought this would be funny at least. =P
That's not how survival of the fattest works though. ;)
Fixed it for our readers in the US
The new right fascists are bilingual. They speak English and Bullshit.
We'll share/send/impose our superbugs with you; you simply cannot hide behind that Swedish flag...
And I say that with great pathos... (I hope I used that word properly - it is the only one to seem to fit)
Do you buy and use pasteurized or raw milk? I haven't made any in years but I'm looking for where I can buy raw milk to start making cheese again.
I get to exert my own geekery by selection of cocktails of bugs to ferment and mature my products.
I've got some ginger beer brewing, fermenting, in a closet as a soft drink. But I'd also like to make alcoholic ginger, and hot pepper, beer. I just hope I can harvest enough ginger from my garden, I know I don't have enough peppers and will have to buy some to make hot pepper beer.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
A "Universal Awareness" isn't needed, why introduce one?
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
a good chance that:
1) There are farmers markets around.
I live 15 minutes bike ride from downtown Minneapolis and we have farmers markets there. Nicollet Mall, with a street section where only buses and taxis are allowed, has farmers market stands on both sides of the street over several blocks I've walked.
2) Some farmers let you just buy a side of a cow (or an entire cow).
There's also Community-supported agriculture or CSA where people buy a share of a farm's output. Buy a share and every week or so you'll get a box of produce, milk and cheese, meat, or what have you.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
A. Brown says the corn feeding or corn fattened cows are done for two reasons, adding weight and homogenizing the taste.
Cattle were originally fed corn because farmers had silos full of corn ranchers could get cheap. This worked out for both as the farmers were guarantied buyers. Today most of the corn grown in the US is fed to livestock. That's one reason vegetarians push their diet, if most people switched to vegetarian diets then less land would be needed to grow food. Even so, personally I don't plan on becoming one myself though I'd rather grow, hunt, and raise, or trade most of my food.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
In Hog Valley, FL? Gosh, it's been years since I've hunted there, along the St John's River, or in the Everglades.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
That's why laws should change according to pressure from citizens (environment), which is what often, but not always, happens :)
Should there be a law?
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
If you would have RTFA, you would realize that the animals are being pumped full of antibiotics to increase size, not to keep them disease free.
You obviously missed "'The problem is that the animal agriculture industry makes massive use of low-dose antibiotics for growth promotion and in place of effective infection prevention methods,' Young said". Antibiotics are used for both growth promotion AND to keep the animals "disease free".
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
Although I would agree that we should only feed animals feed that evolution has designed them to eat, what they eat has little or nothing to do with bacteriological disease. The bacteriological and viral diseases are there because the animals are penned up in much closer proximity than thay are evolved for.
What animals eat does have something to do with "bacteriological disease". Eating the wrong food reduces the immune system which make animals more prone to diseases. In humans changing diets can also alter the human flora in people's guts. The same applies to other species of animals. Some of these microorganisms are beneficial while others may be harmful, changing the diet can increase harmful and decrease beneficial organisms.
cats REALLY like fish
One of my cats caught and partially ate a rabbit. I say "partially" because someone else in my building scared the cat away then complained about the carcass in the yard and I had to dispose of it.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
The fact that logics show that "not living long" is not the same than "dying right now".
I then invite you to be the first person infected by a multiple drug resistant bacteria. You can then use your wealth to find a cure. Oh, and you only have 1 month to live without a treatment.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
BS! I dare you to cite one scientific study supporting your statement. Here are some studies or references to studies that conclude organic food [pdf] can feed the world.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
As a vegetarian, you're threatening the food chain on an even deeper level:
http://www.safe-food.org/-issue/dangers.html
What does that have to do with vegetarian diets? All that page talks about is genetic engineering. Forget "vegetarian", "veg" doesn't even appear on that page.
Falcon
Oh, and no, I'm not a vegetarian. Or a vegan. I am an omnivore. And I love to hunt.
Should there be a Law?
pesticides and the subsequent run-off, monocultures, exploitation of third world labor to provide us with out of season vegetables.
What exactly is your point? Vegetarians are responsible for GMO crops? For run-off, monocultures, or third world labor to provide us with out of season vegetables?
First let me get this out of the way, I am not a vegetarian or a vegan. I eat animals and animal products. I even love to hunt. However I eat a lot of vegetables as well, especially what I grow in my garden. And I preserve what I can. So far this year with tomatoes I've canned juice, sauce, and soup. With tomatillos I made some salsa. I used ginger, oranges, and rhubarb to make sauce. With root veggies I made root soup. I pickled cucumbers and onions. And I'm not done. I've got some more rhubarb and strawberries I'll can as well as use to make fruit leathers with.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
No, it's a way to say "if you don't understand what it does, don't fuck with my code."
Support my political activism on Patreon.
Once again humans get the epic FAIL on learning from their mistakes. Didn't I learn somewhere that humans were the most evolutionarily "advanced" due to their outstanding ability to adapt? R.I.P. Humanity. Killed by the cheeseburger.
Naturopathic Medicine for Holistic Health and Wellness
America's top pork producer churns out a sea of waste that has destroyed rivers, killed millions of fish and generated one of the largest fines in EPA history. Welcome to the dark side of the other white meat.