New evidence of livestock mistreatment
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Just months after revealing undercover footage of cows too sick to stand being pushed and prodded at a slaughterhouse in Chino, the Humane Society of the U.S. publicly presented more evidence on Wednesday of cows, mostly sick or frail ‘downer cows,’ being mistreated at various auction houses across the country where they are sold for slaughter. Undercover investigators collected the footage during April and May, Humane Society officials said.
The treatment that the footage captures is appalling -- but it is watchable. (It opens with a calf being kicked.)
According to the Humane Society, the issue is not just that downer cows are mistreated but that they are being shepherded into the food supply, where they increase the possibility of spreading disease. The organization’s undercover investigation of Hallmark/Westland Meatpacking Co. in Chino led to the largest meal recall in U.S. history.
‘No longer can anyone in government or industry reasonably claim that the abuses we documented at Hallmark were an aberration or an isolated case,’ said Wayne Pacelle, chief executive of the Humane Society, on his organization’s website Wednesday. ‘This gross mistreatment of spent dairy cows should turn your stomach, and they have been uncovered in location after location.’
USA Today reports on the issue from Washington, D.C.
-- Carla Hall
