Slaughterhouses: Corona Hotspot – It Is Time to Ban Meat

A growing number of slaughterhouses in Germany are revealing themselves to be COVID-19 hotspots due to exploitative working conditions. On Wednesday, the Cabinet presented plans to ban contract work and temporary employment arrangements in this industry.

Yet the serious suffering of animals was once again not addressed by the federal government. With a series of advertisements in several national and local daily newspapers, PETA is now calling on citizens and politicians to take sustainable and humane measures: Last Saturday, readers of the Pforzheimer Zeitung and the Allgemeine Zeitung Coesfeld were confronted with a large, blood-stained cleaver bearing the text “Close the slaughterhouses”, urging the permanent closure of the COVID-19 hotspot slaughterhouses in Birkenfeld and Coesfeld. The Segeberger Zeitung, however, refused to print the advertisement targeting the slaughterhouse in Bad Bramstedt; the image was instead published on 21 May in the Lübecker Nachrichten. Two full-page advertisements in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung last weekend, as well as in the Süddeutsche Zeitung this coming Saturday, show readers the terror-filled face of a cow in a German slaughterhouse having a captive bolt pistol held to its head. Under the headline “It Is Time to Ban Meat,” PETA informs readers about the suffering and environmental consequences for humans and animals that accompany meat consumption.

«Slaughterhouses are hellholes for animals. The meat industry is so well connected politically that it doesn't even have to fear penalties for the exploitation of people. Such branches of business have no place in a civilized society, which is why we appeal to all people to turn their backs on meat and other animal products», says Dr. Edmund Haferbeck, Head of the Legal and Science Department at PETA.

Meat and Infectious Diseases

Before their throats are slit while fully conscious — hundreds of thousands of times over, due to often inadequate stunning — these animals eke out an existence in the most confined spaces, surrounded by their own excrement. Animal enclosures can become veritable breeding grounds for deadly pathogens, and these conditions promote the emergence and spread of disease-causing agents in slaughterhouses as well. 75 percent — that is, three out of every four newly emerging infectious diseases — have been transmitted from animals to humans, making them zoonoses. As early as 2004, the World Health Organization (WHO) identified the growing demand for animal products as one of the main causes of the emergence of zoonoses.COVID-19, the H5N1 bird flu, the SARS pandemic, MERS-CoV, the deadly Ebola fever, countless victims of multi-resistant pathogens, and even AIDS share a common denominator: humanity's greed for meat. Such connections illustrate how closely animal welfare issues and pandemics are intertwined.

Meat and the Environment

Global animal agriculture generates more greenhouse gases than the entire transport sector combined. In 2018, the United Nations declared that meat consumption must be reduced by up to 90 percent in order to avoid the worst impacts of climate change. A study published in 2019 by the University of Oxford shows that a vegan lifestyle saves two tonnes of greenhouse gases per person per year. The high levels of cholesterol and saturated fatty acids in meat have an adverse effect on health — excessive consumption is a significant risk factor for cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and various forms of cancer.

What You Can Do

Please refrain from supporting this unscrupulous industry and the associated exploitation of workers and animals. Always choose plant-based products when shopping. Every purchase of animal products sets off a chain of events that could potentially trigger the next zoonosis. Help reduce the risk of another pandemic. Sign up today for the free, no-obligation Veganstart program and make a difference.

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