AR-News: (CA) letter re animal treatment & disease

[Mary Finelli]

Article summary from the 4/19 AnimalNet:

CRAMPED CHICKEN QUARTERS RIPE FOR DISEASE
The Daily News (Kamloops), April 19, 2004


Ted Joslin of Kamloops, B.C. writes that Larissa Lutjen's letter on April 15 
on the subject of chickens challenges him to end years of silent disgust, by 
offering his written endorsement of her timely protest. Our governments 
spend vast amounts of time and money regulating food production and sale by 
licence and quota, but pay little attention to the welfare of the livestock.

It has been known for years that cattle unfit for human consumption are 
routinely added to cattle feed in what amounts to enforced cannibalism. We 
add chemicals to their diet in order to speed up their weight gain and 
abnormally increase the supply of milk to their distended udders.

We have routinely studied the disastrous effects of solitary confinement on 
human beings and described it as cruel and unusual punishment, yet we do not 
hesitate to confine hens in small wire cages just large enough for them to 
sit and lay eggs. Anyone who has seen and appreciated the difference between 
an egg produced by a free range chicken and that forced from a caged bird, 
will understand the detrimental effect on general health. Watch a crowded 
hatchery where baby chicks are struggling for living space and any infection 
or contagion is immediately passed through the scrambling mass.

It seems we are more concerned with the condition of animals in the wild. 
When they move to human custody, we seem to lose interest in their welfare 
and our own.

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