Posted on July 2, 2020 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
A new strain of the swine flu virus, H1N1 G4, has been detected both in pigs and humans in China.
More than 1 in 10 pig farm workers in the new study had already been infected, according to antibody blood tests which showed exposure to the virus.The tests also showed that as many as 4.4% of the general population also appeared to have been exposed. Pigs have been shown to be hosts or “mixing vessels” for this new virus dubbed G4. Although the virus has not caused illnesses in people, and has not yet passed from humans to humans, scientists fear that it might mutate and cause another global pandemic.
Besides a new vaccine, I fear that the preventative measures will be focussed on increased factory farm biosecurity instead of ending a flawed system. Last April we wrote about pandemics and factory farming, and interviewed Dr Michael Greger MD who explained, “the sheer number of animals, overcrowding, the stress crippling their immune systems, the ammonia from the decomposing waste burning their lungs. The lack of sunlight, lack of fresh air, put all these factors together and we have the perfect storm environment for breeding these so-called ‘super strains’ of influenza”.
London’s top public health official has said that meat processing plants are one of the areas where a second wave of COVID is most likely to emerge in the capital; “food factories are an ‘emerging area’ of concern because of the proximity of workers to each other and the low pay, meaning staff were unlikely to be able to afford to self-isolate at home if they fell sick”.. Outbreaks have been seen in meat processing plants in Wales and Yorkshire, and in Germany, France, Spain and the US. The USA reports 20,000 infections of COVID in meat packing plant workers.
This week two democrat senators are accusing Smithfields (and other meat factory companies) of manipulating the COVID crisis to force ‘deregulatory measures’, allowing them to stay open in the name of feeding the American public. Turns out sales to China were up more than ever during that time, in fact they were record breaking! Meanwhile, China has banned imports from specific US, Brazilian, UK and German packing plants with a high incidence of COVID. Was this because Chinese authorities were concerned about the possibility that the meat itself could carry the COVID virus?
Last May we made a short film about the COVID and African Swine Flu outbreaks at Smithfield Foods, the biggest player in the US pork industry. The driver of this corporate take over from family farms to massive factory farms is the development banks. For example, in the nineteen-nineties Smithfield was granted a $100m soft loan to expand into Poland where they could take advantage of cheap labour and poorly enforced worker and animal welfare standards to outcompete pig farmers across the EU – farmers must ‘get big or get out of the industry’. See the documentary about this corporate take-over in our Channel 4 film Pig Business.
If Parliament fails to add vital amendments to the Agriculture Bill, Smithfield no longer has to go to Poland to get their deeply flawed factory farmed pork onto our shelves . In response to the NFU’s 1 million-strong petition to protect UK farmers from being undercut by substandard imports, the government has set up a Trade and Agriculture Commission. But it won’t be enough to protect UK farmers as its recommendations will only be advisory and not legally binding. A dangerous position when members of Boris’s cabinet, like Liz Truss, are prepared to sacrifice our farmers on the altar of so-called free trade.
London – As the Bill continues to be debated in the House of Lords, Lord Dundee has tabled some additional amendments to include support for rearing livestock outdoors, for agro-ecological smallholder farming and for making land available to new food growers.
So, lobby politicians to improve the Bill by sending your own version of this letter to your MP or member of the House of Lords, forward our newsletter to friends, family and networks, share Farms Not Factories posts on social media, and urge your friends and local restaurants to buy only high welfare local pork/meat products.
Please share this newsletter or just the videos/info with your friends and networks.
Posted on July 2, 2020 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
SENSATION! The French animal protection party “Parti Animaliste” has now won seats in an election for the first time since it was founded four years ago.
It ran the municipal elections with twelve separate lists and an additional twelve individual candidacies on lists of other parties.
The result could hardly have been better: The Parti Animaliste now has 12 seats – including in Paris, Grenoble, Montpellier, and Nantes.
Congratulations, dear fighters for justice!
So that animals, nature, and people can have a future worth living!
Incidentally, according to a current survey, 72% of the French demand that local politics should also explicitly commit to more animal protection.
This shows that all political levels have to make an effort to adequately tackle one of the greatest upcoming political future tasks: that all sentient beings are understood as individuals and that they must be actively protected against suffering and risks.
We congratulate our fellow campaigners and thank everyone who has campaigned for this sensational result!
Posted on July 2, 2020 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
An activist with a heart of gold!
In 2012 she was in Germany to assist Captain Paul Watsonwhile he was detained in Germany at the request of the governments of Costa Rica and Japan to be extradited. The world-famous actress and animal rights activist is also a member of the board of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society.
And I mean…When Julian Assange hid in the Ecuadorian embassy in London, Pamela Andersons visited him several times. Now she even went to prison for him. She also visited the WikiLeaks founder in detention in London.
In an interview in the German magazine “Der Spiegel”, she said: I visited him because he is my friend. I wanted to support him. I wanted to hug him. I think he and WikiLeaks have made important information available to the world; on US Army were crimes in Iraq and other evils by powerful people.
It’s just not right to throw him in a maximum-security prison for publishing important documents. ”
Posted on July 1, 2020 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
IMAGES of a seal that has been so neglected it has become covered in seaweed has led to calls for the zoo keeping it to be closed.
Animal rights activists want the small zoo in the Magdalena Peninsula,in Santander, Spain, closed immediately and have condemned it as a “throwback to the bad old days”.
Images of unhappy animals at the zoo have been circulating on Spanish social media sites and have led to a petition for its closure.
The animal rights group AnimaNaturalis says more than 6,000 have signed its letter of protest to Santander council.
Local councilor Daniel Fernández:“Those pictures convey an image of inconceivable and disgraceful treatment of animals when we see things like the sea lion pen with no water.
“This would be unacceptable anywhere in the world, but it is even more surprising in a city that wants to position itself as a tourist attraction.”
The seals have had no water generally from the sea, they can only swim in standing water, the consistency of which is already greenish and obviously dirty.
One woman even noticed that they were swimming a dead or sick seal on the water filled with grass and moss.
After the complaint, the Santander City Council assured that the dead animals had died naturally and that there were no animals that had been abused or lived under unfortunate conditions as they were all well looked after by veterinarians.
However, the videos leave their own and strangers speechless.
And I mean…It was never and for no animal a species-appropriate life in the zoo.
Now the prison owners give up their inmates because they cannot make money with them.
In Germany, we are currently experiencing similar crimes in the zoos.
The corona pandemic has led to a crisis in (almost) all zoos around the world that is trying to survive the mandatory quarantine.
Some managed to get support, but others who got nothing refused to close.
This is the case in the mini -zoo in Magdalena Peninsula, Santander in Spain, a terrible situation!
“Seems to be letting itself die,” said charity’s leader Aïda Gascón.
And why don’t you do something to prevent it @ Aïda Gascón? Would you let your child die too?
The answer is because there is no profit from them at the moment!
The stupid visitors who co-finance this misery with their tickets stay away because of Corona, the zoo-business is bad, so some inmates have to fall a victim.
@Mayor Gema Igual, we demand that you close this place and rescue these animals urgently. We watch you!
Posted on June 30, 2020 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
The “Jagd & Hund (Hunting and Dog)” fair, which takes place annually in Dortmund, Germany, is Europe’s largest hunting fair.
The organizers advertise themselves with the participation of exhibitors from over 40 nations from all continents.
Among them are almost 180 tour operators who offer the shooting down of individuals of endangered and protected species such as various deep sea birds and songbirds, polar bears, rhinos, elephants, lions, leopards, giraffes, monkeys, brown bears, and wolves – quite legally.
As in colonial times, wealthy trophy hunters shoot endangered animals.
We are currently experiencing the greatest loss of species since time immemorial.
Hunting methods are used that are prohibited in Germany for good reasons: hunting with a bow and arrow, crossbow, or revolver. A hunting license is often not even required.
In some places, wild animals such as for example Lions specially bred in hunting farms to have them shot by trophy hunters in large enclosures.
In Africa alone, 18,000 trophy hunters kill over 100,000 wild animals each year.
The shooting down of an individual animal often endangers their entire family and group system.
Hundreds of trophies of internationally protected species are imported to Germany every year.
According to the federal government between 2017 and 2019, it was 89 leopards, 89 hippos, 89 brown bears, 85 elephants, 54 lions, 46 wolves, 23 Argali sheep, 17 Cheetahs, 6 polar bears, 6 white rhinos, 1 black rhinoceros, hundreds of zebras and monkeys and numerous other species.
And I mean…Does anyone really believe that even a poor family in these countries benefits from the murderous big game hunt?
In countries with an obscure legal situation, with horrendous corruption, with often dictatorial governments, where the very few rich bathe in gold and where the very poor have hardly a bite to eat?
Hunting is (almost) in all cases a leisure pleasure, a pervert one, for an elite group of people with exclusive rights, who is partly willing to pay a lot of money to enjoy a very special but psychotic thrill.
Hunters kill up to five million wild animals and an estimated several hundred thousand dogs and cats in Germany every year.
In just a few weeks, private individuals can complete the hunting license (the “Green Graduation”), then lease a hunting ground and shoot legally defenseless fellow-creatures in their free time.
There are only about 1,000 professional hunters, mostly forest officials, against the approximately 380,000 hobby hunters in Germany.
Hunting is not nature conservation, because not only 5.5 million wild animals die every year, but more than 350,000 cats and over 40,000 dogs are killed by hunters (information taken from official hunting publications). Trusting hunters in animal welfare is like trusting a pedophile to run a children’s daycare center.
My request is, therefore: hunt the hunters out of the forest!
Serbian Animals Voice (SAV) 