Health and intensive rearing of animals

• Published date: 01 December 2022

Apart from the significant ethical question mark that has hung over the industry for decades - the ethical issue being the justification on moral grounds for raising animals indoors in cramped and highly stressful environments - these animal factories pose an unacceptable threat to the human population of the planet which we all, animals and humans, share

We are being constantly reassured that the H5N1 avian flu virus poses no threat to humans. Yet no virologist can give a cast-iron guarantee that a new strain will not mutate in the future, one that infects the human body and wreaks havoc across the globe. With tens of billions of animals, mainly poultry and pigs, crammed into sheds all over the world, including here in Ireland, where approximately 100 million birds and 3.5...