The next pandemic?

[JParis]

Soy boys  , no thanks

[YoDoug]

just for reference, define "factory farm"

For me, I think there is a few criteria that make a factory farm;

1. Mostly or all indoor living. Animals are kept in barns their whole lives.
2. Density of animals. When they have little to no room to move.
3. The conditions almost certainly require constant use of antibiotics.
4. Overall size, which contributes to all of the above.

I am keeping my personal beliefs about diet and other out of this as I do respect the small organic farms right to exist. If I were "king for a day" I would eliminate all subsidies to meat, feed crop, and dairy farms. Let the free market reign.

nearly every pig on every family or corporate farm is raised indoors and have been since the 80's.  My dad raised hogs on dirt when I was a young. you can't make money.  It would be similar to a shop trying to make money without CNC machines. Hogs on dirt try to root out from under the fence. You have to put rings in their noses to keep them from doing it. they freeze to death during hard winters. the  runoff from hogs raised on dirt get's into streams and water supplies.  Raising them in buildings eliminates all that.  you would probably be surprised by the disinfecting process that happens between one shipment of hogs and another in those buildings.

2 I know a lot of farmers. I do not know a single farmer that uses antibiotics on animals that are not sick.  Antibiotics can get expensive quickly.  And every farmer I know uses the approach that preventive measures are better than treating the animal once they get sick. an on-going joke among farmers is to say, in their best Oprah voice, "Everybody get's free ANTIBIOTICS today!  You get an antibiotic and you get an antibiotic! it's become a joke because of  people making those statements.

milk is tested for antibiotics.  If a 5000 gallon vat of milk has even the smallest hint of antibiotics in it. the entire vat is dumped out. Dairy farmers are barely making it as it is.  They can not afford to let that happen.  Dairy farmers treat their cows better than any farmer.

last year, I raised a couple bottle calves.  I paid $400 each. both of them got sick. I ended up having to put about $200 of antibiotics and vet care into them.  One of them still died.  The other made it and I ended up butchering it myself.  I had him tested for antibiotics before I did. it had been 18months since those shots.  He tested negative.  which is exactly what the vet told me would happen, but I wanted to know for my own sake.

I won't try to argue that I know more about farming. Heck, I don't even own a tractor. I do know that it is more of the close proximity and high numbers of animals that is the perfect conditions for viruses to thrive.

As far as antibiotics. Farmers may joke about that, but world wide antibiotics for ag is $10 billion plus a year market. You don't get to that much money being spent without large scale vaccinations going on.

As for the cost of raising animals in safer, kinder ways being more expensive, that's kind of my point. If that's what it takes then the free market should dictate the price. This whole subsidizing to keep animal products cheap for consumers has put this country on a bad trajectory environmentally and physically. You can lay a graph of incidence rates of heart disease, diabetes, etc over a graph of subsidies to animal producers and they follow the same curve. Likewise as the worlds population grows it is not feasible for the world to keep consuming animals products at the same rate. The land use, air pollution, water use, and waste created are not on sustainable paths. If the subsidies were gone and meat and animal products were priced accordingly it would reduce consumption. Hopefully to sustainable levels.

[YoDoug]

just for reference, define "factory farm"

For me, I think there is a few criteria that make a factory farm;

1. Mostly or all indoor living. Animals are kept in barns their whole lives.
2. Density of animals. When they have little to no room to move.
3. The conditions almost certainly require constant use of antibiotics.
4. Overall size, which contributes to all of the above.
.........

That actually sounds like the Ark.

Not at all. The ark only had two of each species. A virus often needs to go through hundreds of thousands of hosts before it mutates enough to jump species. Hence the reason these tightly cramped mega barns of pigs and poultry are dangerous.

[pmartin]

Sub therapeutic antibiotic use is what YoDoug is talking about. I don't know the date but it was noticed that the fish on a certain river were growing larger than similar fish that were living on other rivers. It was discovered that a pharmaceutical plant was dumping waste from antibiotic production into the water and the conclusion was that the ultra low dosage of antibiotic resulted in more of the energy in the food became available to the fish. Ergo, larger fish.
 
Here is a quote from the internet.
 
"In large part, sub therapeutic feeding of antibiotic drugs is a management tool to prevent infection and to facilitate the use of confinement housing. This practice allows larger numbers of animals to be maintained in a healthy state and at a lower cost per unit to the farmer."

[TylerBeer]

Soy boys  , no thanks

They get soy girls. My wife is vegan, and in her 30s. she doesn't look a day past 22. I consider this a great long term investment.

[YoDoug]

Soy boys  , no thanks

They get soy girls. My wife is vegan, and in her 30s. she doesn't look a day past 22. I consider this a great long term investment.

For me it's about quality of life. A few years ago my doctor warned me that I would be on high blood pressure and cholesterol meds in a few years. I was sore and tired all the time. Back issues that kept me from sleeping well. My quality of life was declining fast. Flash forward to today, I am enjoying life. I feel as good as I did in my 20's. Zero medications. At Jiujitsu I am able to grapple with guys half my age and keep up no problem. I can go snowboarding now without worrying if my back is going to hurt the next three days. A whole foods plant based diet is like a fountain of youth.

[Matthew Hajicek]

Sub therapeutic antibiotic use is what YoDoug is talking about.

Yup.  And those are the perfect conditions to help bacteria evolve antibiotic resistance. If you take a petri dish and coat a section in a high dose of antibiotics, and seed bacteria in the other part, the bacteria will stop in a sharp line at the antibiotic.  However, if you have the coating of antibiotic gradiated from very week to full strength over a sizable distance, the bacteria culture will gradually develop better and better resistances as it spreads to cover the whole dish.

">

[Tim Johnson]

For me, I think there is a few criteria that make a factory farm;

1. Mostly or all indoor living. Animals are kept in barns their whole lives.
2. Density of animals. When they have little to no room to move.
3. The conditions almost certainly require constant use of antibiotics.
4. Overall size, which contributes to all of the above.

I am keeping my personal beliefs about diet and other out of this as I do respect the small organic farms right to exist. If I were "king for a day" I would eliminate all subsidies to meat, feed crop, and dairy farms. Let the free market reign.

nearly every pig on every family or corporate farm is raised indoors and have been since the 80's.  My dad raised hogs on dirt when I was a young. you can't make money.  It would be similar to a shop trying to make money without CNC machines. Hogs on dirt try to root out from under the fence. You have to put rings in their noses to keep them from doing it. they freeze to death during hard winters. the  runoff from hogs raised on dirt get's into streams and water supplies.  Raising them in buildings eliminates all that.  you would probably be surprised by the disinfecting process that happens between one shipment of hogs and another in those buildings.

2 I know a lot of farmers. I do not know a single farmer that uses antibiotics on animals that are not sick.  Antibiotics can get expensive quickly.  And every farmer I know uses the approach that preventive measures are better than treating the animal once they get sick. an on-going joke among farmers is to say, in their best Oprah voice, "Everybody get's free ANTIBIOTICS today!  You get an antibiotic and you get an antibiotic! it's become a joke because of  people making those statements.

milk is tested for antibiotics.  If a 5000 gallon vat of milk has even the smallest hint of antibiotics in it. the entire vat is dumped out. Dairy farmers are barely making it as it is.  They can not afford to let that happen.  Dairy farmers treat their cows better than any farmer.

last year, I raised a couple bottle calves.  I paid $400 each. both of them got sick. I ended up having to put about $200 of antibiotics and vet care into them.  One of them still died.  The other made it and I ended up butchering it myself.  I had him tested for antibiotics before I did. it had been 18months since those shots.  He tested negative.  which is exactly what the vet told me would happen, but I wanted to know for my own sake.

I won't try to argue that I know more about farming. Heck, I don't even own a tractor. I do know that it is more of the close proximity and high numbers of animals that is the perfect conditions for viruses to thrive.

As far as antibiotics. Farmers may joke about that, but world wide antibiotics for ag is $10 billion plus a year market. You don't get to that much money being spent without large scale vaccinations going on.

As for the cost of raising animals in safer, kinder ways being more expensive, that's kind of my point. If that's what it takes then the free market should dictate the price. This whole subsidizing to keep animal products cheap for consumers has put this country on a bad trajectory environmentally and physically. You can lay a graph of incidence rates of heart disease, diabetes, etc over a graph of subsidies to animal producers and they follow the same curve. Likewise as the worlds population grows it is not feasible for the world to keep consuming animals products at the same rate. The land use, air pollution, water use, and waste created are not on sustainable paths. If the subsidies were gone and meat and animal products were priced accordingly it would reduce consumption. Hopefully to sustainable levels.

My grandfather raised pigs (about thirty) and they were outside in their own two ten acre pastures with wooden roofed huts that they used at their convenience. The unused pastures would have turnips and sugar beets planted along with alfalfa so they could forage for their own food. During the late summer the unsold potatoes would get cooked in a large "witches" pot about once a week until the taters were gone. They almost never tried to leave the pastures. About half got sold and slaughtered every year and the other half grew the next batch. I don't remember any of them ever getting sick.

[beej]

[quote="Tim Johnson" post_id=3152 time=1610472304 user_id=68]

My grandfather raised pigs (about thirty) and they were outside in their own two ten acre pastures with wooden roofed huts that they used at their convenience. The unused pastures would have turnips and sugar beets planted along with alfalfa so they could forage for their own food. During the late summer the unsold potatoes would get cooked in a large "witches" pot about once a week until the taters were gone. They almost never tried to leave the pastures. About half got sold and slaughtered every year and the other half grew the next batch. I don't remember any of them ever getting sick.
[/quote]

a single Pork butchering plant will kill about 30,000-60,000 head of hogs per day. Just to keep up with demand. And they use every part of the hog.  How many acres would it take, to raise hogs like your grandfather?

[YoDoug]

[quote="Tim Johnson" post_id=3152 time=1610472304 user_id=68]

My grandfather raised pigs (about thirty) and they were outside in their own two ten acre pastures with wooden roofed huts that they used at their convenience. The unused pastures would have turnips and sugar beets planted along with alfalfa so they could forage for their own food. During the late summer the unsold potatoes would get cooked in a large "witches" pot about once a week until the taters were gone. They almost never tried to leave the pastures. About half got sold and slaughtered every year and the other half grew the next batch. I don't remember any of them ever getting sick.

a single Pork butchering plant will kill about 30,000-60,000 head of hogs per day. Just to keep up with demand. And they use every part of the hog.  How many acres would it take, to raise hogs like your grandfather?
[/quote]

There is not enough acres to meet the current demand for animal products using those types of farming. However the large factory farms are not sustainable and pose risks looking into the future. One way or another the world is going to have to find an answer for this, whether it is reduced consumption, lab grown as Tyler mentioned, or other. Considering the comorbidities that make Covid-19 deadly, our worlds current health trajectory, and rise of antibiotic resistant viruses, the next pandemic may be what addresses the problem by significantly reducing the human population. It would be nice to find a different solution but as long as we are happy getting cheap subsidized McRibs, we could be setting up a real catastrophic pandemic.

[Matthew Hajicek]

a single Pork butchering plant will kill about 30,000-60,000 head of hogs per day. Just to keep up with demand. And they use every part of the hog.  How many acres would it take, to raise hogs like your grandfather?

That's key to the issue.  Demand is that high in large part due to subsidies keeping the prices down.  Eliminate the subsidies, price goes up, demand goes down, people eat less meat and more plants.  It would also make alternative meat sources (like lab meat) more economically viable.

[beej]

[quote="Tim Johnson" post_id=3152 time=1610472304 user_id=68]

My grandfather raised pigs (about thirty) and they were outside in their own two ten acre pastures with wooden roofed huts that they used at their convenience. The unused pastures would have turnips and sugar beets planted along with alfalfa so they could forage for their own food. During the late summer the unsold potatoes would get cooked in a large "witches" pot about once a week until the taters were gone. They almost never tried to leave the pastures. About half got sold and slaughtered every year and the other half grew the next batch. I don't remember any of them ever getting sick.

a single Pork butchering plant will kill about 30,000-60,000 head of hogs per day. Just to keep up with demand. And they use every part of the hog.  How many acres would it take, to raise hogs like your grandfather?

There is not enough acres to meet the current demand for animal products using those types of farming. However the large factory farms are not sustainable and pose risks looking into the future. One way or another the world is going to have to find an answer for this, whether it is reduced consumption, lab grown as Tyler mentioned, or other. Considering the comorbidities that make Covid-19 deadly, our worlds current health trajectory, and rise of antibiotic resistant viruses, the next pandemic may be what addresses the problem by significantly reducing the human population. It would be nice to find a different solution but as long as we are happy getting cheap subsidized McRibs, we could be setting up a real catastrophic pandemic.
[/quote]

i guess, I don't understand why it is not sustainable. What virus's or sickness have come from these farms in the US? I know there have been food recalled from time to time for samonella, and such.  Also vegetables get recalled from time to time because of listeria concerns. But as far as infectious disease, what has happened, that I have missed?

[YoDoug]

a single Pork butchering plant will kill about 30,000-60,000 head of hogs per day. Just to keep up with demand. And they use every part of the hog.  How many acres would it take, to raise hogs like your grandfather?

There is not enough acres to meet the current demand for animal products using those types of farming. However the large factory farms are not sustainable and pose risks looking into the future. One way or another the world is going to have to find an answer for this, whether it is reduced consumption, lab grown as Tyler mentioned, or other. Considering the comorbidities that make Covid-19 deadly, our worlds current health trajectory, and rise of antibiotic resistant viruses, the next pandemic may be what addresses the problem by significantly reducing the human population. It would be nice to find a different solution but as long as we are happy getting cheap subsidized McRibs, we could be setting up a real catastrophic pandemic.

i guess, I don't understand why it is not sustainable. What virus's or sickness have come from these farms in the US? I know there have been food recalled from time to time for samonella, and such.  Also vegetables get recalled from time to time because of listeria concerns. But as far as infectious disease, what has happened, that I have missed?

Big AG does a good job at suppressing info that is negative towards them, and largely, people don't like their food choices to be challenged so they avoid researching and taking in info that does so. Here is an article citing CDC sources. H1N1 (swine flu) and H5 (bird flu) both evolved from factory farms to infect humans.

We don't yet know the full history of the emergence of Covid-19, the particular strain of coronavirus that now threatens us. But with recent pandemic virus threats from influenza viruses such as H1N1 (swine flu) or H5N1 (bird flu) there is no ambiguity: those viruses evolved on chicken and pig factory farms. Genetic analyses have shown that crucial components of H1N1 emerged from a virus circulating in North American pigs. But it is commercial poultry operations that appear to be the Silicon Valley of viral development.

It is on chicken factory farms that we have most frequently found viruses that have mutated from a form found only in animals into a form that harms humans (what scientists call "antigenic shift"). It is these "novel" viruses that our immune systems are unfamiliar with and that can prove most deadly.

Of 16 strains of novel influenza viruses currently identified by the CDC as "of special concern," including H5N1, 11 come from viruses of the H5 or H7 type. In 2018 a group of scientists analysed the 39 antigenic shifts, also called "conversion events," that we know played a key role in the emergence of these particularly dangerous strains. Their results prove that "all but two of these events were reported in commercial poultry production systems".

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/apr/20/factory-farms-pandemic-risk-covid-animal-human-health">https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... man-health">https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/apr/20/factory-farms-pandemic-risk-covid-animal-human-health

[Matthew Hajicek]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Ik-59-MRww&feature=youtu.be"> ... e=youtu.be">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Ik-59-MRww&feature=youtu.be

[YoDoug]

[quote="Matthew Hajicek" post_id=3201 time=1610486695 user_id=57]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Ik-59-MRww&feature=youtu.be"> ... e=youtu.be">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Ik-59-MRww&feature=youtu.be
[/quote]

Another thing about antibiotics (Amoxycillin, Zpak, etc) is they destroy your gut microbiome. Antibiotics don't care if its a virus, bad bacteria, or good bacteria that help the body. When you take antibiotics they actually destroy the good bacteria in your gut that help keep your immune system strong, regulate fat storage, regulate mood, etc.  Early last year I had a tooth die and needed a root canal. The tooth had gotten infected and I had to take antibiotics to get it under control. I made sure to go on a good probiotic regiment after and eat lots of prebiotic foods.