Cow sent to slaughter with 129 times the penicillin allowed by law
by Spence Cooper on 11/24/09 at 1:31 pm
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We've got beef with the industry
The hazards in consuming beef continue to multiply. In March, a Minnesota dairy farm — J&L Dairy — sent a cow to be slaughtered that had 129 times the amount of penicillin allowed by law. And last month, another Minnesota dairy farm cow at Evergreen Acres Dairy, had more than four times the amount of an antibiotic allowed by law. Further inspection found that Evergreen Acres had misused ten additional drugs. Evergreen Acres Dairy owner Keith Schaeffer said, “The animal in question was given a shot and it wasn’t recorded. Basically, someone didn’t write it down and it was a mistake.” Schaeffer says he employs four individuals to administer veterinary inoculations for 1,400 cows. You can bet none of them are veterinarians, or even supervised by one.
Lora Pabst with the Minneapolis Star Tribune notes that the Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association cited the J&L Dairy case in an article this month about the hazards of failing to use a veterinarian to advise farmers on animal drugs. The J&L Dairy case “highlights the fact that they didn’t work with a veterinarian as to what would be an appropriate level to use,” said Jeff Bender, director of the University of Minnesota’s Center for Animal Health and Food Safety.
Remember, the FDA only conducts random samples of diary farms. That’s why only 30 farms nationwide have been reprimanded so far this year for violating the rules governing how animal drugs can be used. The massive amounts of antibiotics pumped into cattle are not only consumed by humans via beef, but also in cheese, milk, cream, and all dairy based products. Animals constitute over 50% of all antibiotic use in the U. S. About 9 million pounds of antibiotic feed additives are used annually in the cattle raising process. Is it any wonder then that researchers are increasingly identifying bacteria that resist all currently available antibiotic drugs?
Across the nation, industrialized cattle contain dangerous levels of hormones, antibiotics and host of other chemicals. Cattle are fed a toxic mixture of various hormones to facilitate rapid growth that include estradiol, progesterone, testosterone, zeranol, trenbolone acetate, and melengesterol acetate. “Some researchers warn that human consumption of estrogen from hormone-drugged beef can result in cancer, premature puberty and falling sperm counts.” Herd bulls have been replaced by artificial insemination. Commercial beef is also irradiated to kill bacteria. Radiation causes radiolytic by-products in foods that are carcinogenic. And if all this drugged and radiated beef weren’t hazardous enough, in December 2006, the FDA approved beef cloning and declared it safe for human consumption, with no labeling required.
As we mentioned in a previous article, “The Dangers of Buying Commercial Ground Beef”, if you must eat beef, make friends with your local butcher, and find out what farms the beef is coming from, or buy grass-fed organically raised beef from a small local farmer.
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