Animal Cruelty and the U.S. Beef Recall
RaeLeann Smith is a circus specialist with the animal rights organization PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals). She works to educate people about the cruelty involved in circuses and other animal acts and meets with legislators to develop ordinances that protect animals used for entertainment. She is currently working to promote legislation in Chicago that would be the strongest elephant protection law in the United States. In an article also posted at the Britannica Blog, Smith discusses the rampant abuse of animals and loose enforcement of health regulations at U.S. slaughterhouses.
Here is an excerpt from RaeLeann’s article : In the wake of the largest beef recall in U.S. history—which included 37 million pounds of meat that was sent to schools—lawmakers are questioning whether the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) is doing its job and whether the meat supplied to the school-lunch program is safe. The answer to both queries is a resounding “No,†and People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) is encouraging meat-eaters to rethink their food choices.
On February 17, the USDA announced that it was recalling 143 million pounds of meat produced at the Hallmark/Westland Meat Packing Company in Chino, California. An undercover investigator from The Humane Society of the United States caught workers at this facility using a forklift to shove “downed†animals—those who were too sick or injured to walk—onto the killing floor.