| By: Vanessa Sol | Reading time: 5 minutes From Sentient Media’s newsletter |
| Many Americans are quick to blame the pandemic on China’s eating habits while ignoring the issues within their own food system. |
| LIVE MARKETS AREN’T JUST CHINA’S PROBLEM Even as COVID-19 ravaged slaughterhouse workers and health officials scrambled for answers, hundreds of other disease-prone facilities were overlooked. Major metropolitan areas are housing many of the very same live animal markets found predominantly in Asia and heavily criticized for their role in the spread of COVID-19. In fact, one of the epicenters of the COVID-19 pandemic, New York City, is home to over 80 live animal markets. View the map here. Other cities, such as Philadelphia, Newark, Bloomfield, Cleveland, Chicago, Alexandria, San Antonio, Los Angeles, Oakland, and San Francisco also house live markets. Live markets in America slaughter traditionally farmed animals such as chickens, ducks, turkeys, quails, pigeons, rabbits, goats, lambs, and calves as opposed to wild or exotic animals. However, the conditions and procedures in many U.S. live animal markets reflect those practiced in places that do slaughter and sell wild animals. |
| COMPARING LIVE ANIMAL MARKETS Live markets in the U.S. foster many of the same animal welfare, worker safety, and public health threats as those in other countries, like Wuhan, China—where experts believe COVID-19 may have originated.Animal Welfare: In Chinese live markets, animals are often kept in tight quarters, cramped into wire cages and stacked on top of each other, awaiting slaughter. The scene is comparable to American live markets, with animals kept in similar crates and cages. As you can see in this image from Slaughter Free NYC, “Animals are crowded in crates left outside for extended periods of time; crates are stacked on top of each other, which facilitates the spread of urine and fecal matter on and around birds; birds are left without sustenance for extended periods of time; crates are dragged to their final destination, causing additional, unnecessary injury to the birds (whose feet are broken and/or they get stuck in between crates); birds were clearly in respiratory distress, and not given veterinary care.” Worker Safety: Those working within Chinese and American live animal markets and slaughterhouses are at a heightened risk of contracting COVID-19 due to strict attendance policies and unsanitary working conditions. They are also exposed to blood and excrement and have a high risk of injuries and mental health issues. In Asian wet markets, butchers kill animals on-site to ensure freshness, and vendors douse their stalls in water to wash off the blood. “Meat cleavers rhythmically pound through impossibly large chunks of flesh, flicking bits and juice with each repeated chop,” Investigative photojournalist Jo-Anne McArthur and filmmaker Kelly Guerin traveled to some of Asia’s busiest wet markets to document the epicenter of the country’s bustling wildlife trade. “Workers stand shoulder to shoulder, wielding knives. It’s loud, it’s slippery, it’s wet, and there’s blood everywhere…” This is a union leader’s description of the daily routine inside a typical North American slaughterhouse, bearing a stark resemblance to descriptions of Chinese wet markets. Public Health: Inside Asia’s wet markets, even the most basic health codes are nonexistent. Blood, feces, and animal parts cover the stalls. Much like factory farms, wet markets operate on efficiency with no legal protections for the animals they bind, cage, and slaughter. In the United States, investigative footage shows deceased and sickly animals held in close proximity to live animals. Investigators also found animals confined and covered in each other’s urine and feces, and employees were seen working without gloves or face coverings. Outside live markets, the city streets were found covered in blood and waste. |
| A Bronx resident recently noticed a live market opening next to a playground in her neighborhood. “It has the potential to spread disease if people happen to walk past the slaughterhouse and get feces on their shoes, then bring that into the park,” she said. According to an NYS Department of Agriculture & Markets inspection conducted in 2018, one of the chickens in a Bronx live market called One-Stop Live Market tested positive for H2N2, also known as avian influenza. “These lab results are disturbing, but not surprising,” said James Desmond, DVM, MS, an American veterinarian and infectious disease researcher. “Wet markets that sell live animals house different species in close proximity to each other and to humans. If different strains of influenza in any of these species combine to create a new flu strain, then a more lethal outbreak could occur, similar to the H2N2 pandemic of 1957.” Read the full story here |
Exposing the Big Game 
Reblogged this on The Extinction Chronicles.
I only care about the animals being butchered, not a whit for the health of the butchers. Sure we’ll have a worse pandemic but it is well deserved.