*411 The economic model of factory farming presumes a “high attrition rate outweighed by a massive production rate.” This means that the industry makes more money by mistreating animals and losing a substantial percentage of them due to illness and death than they do by raising fewer healthy animals. As a consequence of the rise of factory farming and its goal of increasing quantity and efficiency at all costs, farmed animals have become commodities. The short lives of animals raised for human consumption in the United States are full of physical pain and mental suffering. These conditions under which the animals are raised present serious concerns for both animal welfare and human health. In order to cut costs and maximize efficiency, factory farms intensively confine the animals in unsanitary warehouses, take dangerous shortcuts in the disposal of animal waste, serve cheap, unwholesome feed containing harmful substances, and regularly administer antibiotics and growth hormones to the animals. The FDA should use this authority or, alternatively, the USDA's authority should be expanded, to eliminate dangerous farming practices in order to improve the quality of meat and dairy products and reduce public health risks.Īnimals involved in large scale food production live in conditions that more closely resemble fetid prisons than farms. However, the FDA arguably already has the authority to regulate certain on-farm activities in order to prevent unsafe food products and the spread of communicable diseases. Currently, the USDA has no statutory authority to regulate the safety of food products at the farm level nor to promulgate regulations to improve animal welfare. Since what farmed animals are fed, what drugs they are given, and the conditions under which they are raised all have a significant impact on the health of the humans who eat them, the agencies responsible for the safety of these food products, namely the USDA and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), should have the authority to regulate *410 farm conditions in order to take preventative measures to protect public health. Given that meat and dairy are such a substantial part of the American diet, comprehensive agency regulation of the safety and quality of these food products should start at the farm level. Economies of scale and concentration of control have allowed such large operations to flourish and to widely overtake and displace the small farm. In order to house this volume of animals at the least cost to the producer, intensive confinement systems called “factory farms” have been created. In order to produce this enormous amount of meat and dairy for consumption in the United States, ten billion animals must be raised and slaughtered and over nine million dairy cows must be milked each year. *409 The negative health consequences of America's meat and dairy-centric diet are exacerbated when one considers how such large quantities of food are produced. Studies have found that the animal product-heavy American diet leads to a dangerous level of saturated fat intake and is associated with the country's rising levels of obesity and disease. Despite the United States Department of Agriculture's (USDA) dietary guidelines emphasizing fruits, vegetables, and whole grains, the average American consumes an excessive one-half pound of meat per day as well as almost one pound of dairy per day. The typical American diet focuses heavily on animal products. The FDA May Have the Authority to Effectuate Certain Food Safety Measures at the Farm Level. The USDA Currently Has No Authority to Effectuate Animal Welfare or Food Safety Measures at the Farm Level. Proposed Regulations to Improve Human Health (and Animal Welfare). How Current Farm Conditions Impact Human Health. Stathopoulos (reprinted with permission).Ĭurrent Conditions on Factory Farms. Finally, Part III proposes six specific on-farm regulations that could drastically reduce such risks and explores whether the proposed regulations could be enacted by the FDA under the existing regulatory scheme.Ĭopyright (c) 2010 New York University Journal of Legislation and Public Policy Anastasia S. Part II describes how those conditions pose significant health risks for humans who consume factory-farmed meat and dairy products, including threats of antibiotic resistance, bacterial infections, cancer, heart disease, animal-origin influenza, and mad cow disease. Part I of this Note discusses the current conditions on factory farms, including the suffering endured by the animals, the unsanitary and crowded conditions, the unwholesome contents of animal feed, and the drugs regularly administered to the animals.
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