This National Pigs in a Blanket Day, we’re celebrating with snuggles for our porcine friends -- but right now, officials over at the USDA are busy plotting the nationwide expansion of a cruel, dangerous high-speed slaughter program. Tell them to halt high-speed horrors TODAY with a quick comment on their latest Facebook post (use our sample below)!
Compassion Over Killing’s 2015 investigation of a model plant for this program documented pigs being cruelly shocked, dragged, and improperly stunned, as well as pigs covered in feces or pus-filled abscesses processed for human consumption--all with a USDA inspection seal of approval.
Yet the agency is plowing ahead with the nationwide expansion of this program, under which kill lines can run at recklessly fast speeds of up to 1,300 pigs slaughtered every hour--or one pig every 5 seconds--while key government inspection duties are shifted to employees of slaughter plants themselves, putting profits over animal, worker, and consumer safety.
The program is so dangerous that former USDA inspector Joe Ferguson even recently declared, “I guess I’m done eating pork,” and the agency’s former chief public health veterinarian, Dr. Pat Basu, has predicted that its expansion “will result in serious food safety and public health failure, and create the possibility of huge economic loss for the U.S., while giving a small section of the swine industry increased line speed and less oversight.”
Pigs, chickens, and other animals killed for food already endure a life of suffering from the moment they are born until their violent deaths at the slaughterhouse. The USDA has a responsibility not to exacerbate this abuse--and put consumer and worker safety on the line--under the guise of “modernization” of slaughter.
TAKE ACTION TODAY: Leave a quick comment on the USDA’s latest Facebook post urging it to put the brakes on high-speed slaughter! Use our sample below or your own polite message.
SAMPLE COMMENT:
Please put the brakes on cruel, dangerous high-speed pig slaughter. A 2015 Compassion Over Killing investigation of high-speed slaughter plant Quality Pork Processors documented pigs being shocked, dragged, and improperly stunned, as well as pigs covered in feces or pus-filled abscesses processed for human consumption--with a USDA inspection seal of approval. Please don’t increase animal suffering--and put workers and consumer safety on the line--under the guise of “modernization” of slaughter. Thank you.