Vegan Victuals: The Blog |

Your infection, please

My online environmental health course functions as a journal article discussion group. And given the relationship between the health of the environment and our food system, I am always dropping V bombs. So as not to lose this all in the closed circuitry of Columbia’s ClassWeb, I’ll post them here too.

The Morens (et. al.) article tracks the path of infectious disease emergence through our rapidly changing global economy. Although environmental changes have created the breeding grounds for infectious diseases to develop and evolve, I have to look more deeply and state my critique on our insatiable consumptive needs and the exploitation of animals as a significant factor of infectious disease emergence. This demand, magnified by population growth and urbanization, creates a very scary predicament all too reminiscent of a science fiction horror movie. And now that I have discredited myself by bringing to mind Bruce Willis movies…

Looking more deeply at animal agriculture and our tainted food system, I see examples of our hand in infectious disease emergence. The Malaysian Nipah epidemic spread because of overcrowded pig pens, the relocation of fruit bats in search of a new habitat as a result of deforestation and our handling of these pigs infected with the bats’ droppings. Mad cow disease has emerged in humans as Variant Crutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD) after British cattle lots supplemented feed with ground meat and bone from slaughtered animals (Morens et. al., 2004). Not to forget E. coli O157:H7 which spreads to humans after eating contaminated food products (spinach, tomatoes, peanuts, etc.) and undercooked meat. This contamination is a result of the slaughtering process of factory farms and the insufficient disposal of the enormous amount of manure produced by factory farm animals (source). While salmonella, the intestinal infection, is also transmitted by manure-contaminated food of animal-origin (source).

As population and industry have risen in our global economy, animals’ habitats diminish leaving us (and them) susceptible to infectious disease. Zoonoses, or infections transmitted to humans by non-human animals, account for huge portion of emerging infections (EIs). Human immuno-deficiency virus (HIV), the deadly virus that causes AIDS, began as a virus affecting non-human primates before “jumping” to humans. Hantavirus pulmonary syndrome (HPS), a deadly disease transmitted by rodents, is another important example of how our interaction with animals leave us open for infectious invasion (Morens et. al., 2004). Morens et. al. (2004) state that “farming, keeping domestic pets, hunting and camping, deforestation and other types of habitat destruction all create new opportunities for infectious agents to invade human hosts” (pg. 243). When I include to that list rampant development and urbanization and intensive animal agriculture, our almost parasitic relationship to Earth, nature and the wild that exists upon it is clear. Perhaps this is one really big underlying cause of this re-emergence of infectious disease? Perhaps it is also plays a significant role in the environmental changes also aiding infectious disease emergence? Then, perhaps, it is a bit clear what would help… changing our diets.