Photo credits 8 страница

According to Grandin: Temple Grandin discussed McDonald’s humane slaughter program with me at length.

the enthusiastic support of the meatpacking industry: Janet Riley, a spokeswoman for American Meat Institute (AMI), told me that the industry has eagerly backed the new guidelines devised by Grandin. Slaughtering animals humanely is a good idea, not just for ethical reasons; it also improves the quality of the meat. The meatpacking industry much prefers a program administered by McDonald’s to one administered by the USDA. McDonald’s inspectors are employed by meatpacking companies; their inspection reports are not open to public scrutiny; and the names of companies that fail an inspection are not disclosed. For the AMI’s resistance to greater USDA involvement in humane slaughter, see “Panel Gives Agriculture Dept. $2.5 Million,” AP Online , July 17, 2001.

I visited meatpacking communities in Texas: Our photoessay, “The Most Dangerous Job in America,” appeared in Mother Jones , July/August 2001.

283 forever surrendering the right to sue: See Tad Fowler, “In the Matter of Michael Glover vs. IBP, Inc. Workplace Injury Settlement Program, Judgement in Arbitration,” p. 3. The ability of workers to sign away their common law rights has been upheld by the Texas Supreme Court, which has given precedence to the sanctity of contracts. See Supreme Court of Texas, Lawrence v. CDB Services, Lambert v. Affiliated Foods, Inc. , Nos. 00–0142, 00–0201, March 29, 2001.

control over the job‑related medical treatment: See “Workplace Injury Settlement Program – Texas,” IBP, p. 7.

The Texas Supreme Court has ruled: According to the court’s perverse logic, companies participating in the worker’s comp system are not allowed to fire injured workers – but companies who leave the system are free to do so. See Supreme Court of Texas, Mexican Railway Company v. Bouchet , No. 96–0194, February 13, 1998.

When Lonita Leal’s right hand was mangled: See Karen Olsson, “Chain of Casualties: How an Amarillo Beef Packing Plant Disposes of Injured Workers,” Texas Observer , May 22, 1998.

When Duane Mullin had both hands: See ibid.

the world’s biggest and most powerful meatpacking firm: See Kelly P. Kissel, “Tyson, IBP Agree to Terms on Chicken–Beef Merger,” AP , June 27, 2001, and Bill Hord, “Livestock Producers ‘Feel the Squeeze’ of Tyson–IBP Deal,” Omaha World‑Herald , January 3, 2001.

$1.7 billion in debt: Cited in Kelly P. Kissel, “Tyson, IBP Agree to Terms on Chicken–Beef Merger,” AP , June 27, 2001.

284 “If McDonald’s is requiring something”: Quoted in Brasher, “McDonald’s Forcing Beef Industry,” Associated Press , March 13, 2001.

about a hundred people: As of August 31, 2001, the number of confirmed and probable cases of vCJD in the United Kingdom had reached 106. See “CJD Statistics,” The UK Creutzfeldt‑Jakob Disease Surveillance Unit, September 3, 2001.

Roughly the same number of people die every day: 41,611 Americans died in traffic accidents during 1999 – a rate about 114 a day. Cited in “Traffic Safety Facts 1999,” National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, U.S. Department of Transportation, 2000.

About 800,000 cattle with mad cow: This figure was cited by Professor Jeffrey Almond, a member of the United Kingdom’s Spongiform Encephalopathies Advisory Committee. See Transcript, “Meeting of U.S. Transmissible Spongiform Encephalopathies Advisory Committee, Gaithersburg, Maryland, June 3, 1999.”

If it takes about ten years: For discussion of vCJD’s potential incubation period, and the implications for public health, see Charles Arthur, “BSE infection: This is a New Disease and We Are Entering the Unknown,” Independent , April 29, 2000; Dorothy Bonn, “Healthy carriers could increase vCJD risk,” The Lancet , September 2, 2000; Charles Arthur, “CJD Threat Could Last for 40 Years, Says Expert,” Independent , November 16, 2000; and David Derbyshire, “Scientists Fear Second Round of Human BSE,” Daily Telegraph , May 16, 2001. For a good review of the risk to human health, see Paul Brown, Robert G. Will, Raymond Bradley, David M. Asher, and Linda Detwiler, “Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy and Variant Creutzfeldt‑Jakob Disease: Background, Evolution, and Current Concerns,” Emerging Infectious Diseases , vol. 7, no. 1, January–February, 2001.

285 much as Three Mile Island and Chernobyl: Nicols Fox astutely made this analogy back in 1997. See Nicols Fox, Spoiled (New York: Basic Books, 1997), p. 331.

British agricultural officials were concerned: See Volume I, “Findings and Conclusions, Section 3, The Early Years, 1986–88,” paragraphs 223–34, The BSE Inquiry: The Report , October 2000.

a leading manufacturer of pet foods: The story of how the British pet food industry took the lead in defending the public from BSE can be found in Volume 5, “Animal Health, 1989–96, Section 3, Introduction of the Animal SBO Ban,” paragraphs 3.1–3.26, The BSE Inquiry: The Report ; Volume 6, “Human Health, 1989–96, Section 3, Introduction of the Ban on Specified Bovine Offal,” paragraphs 3.91–3.203, ibid.; and Anthony Bevins, “How We Had to Rely on Pedigree Chum Firm for CJD Advice,” Express , October 27, 2000.

a good idea: See Volume 6, “Human Health, 1989–96, Section 3, Introduction of the Ban on Specified Bovine Offal,” paragraph 3.201, The BSE Inquiry: The Report.

some of the nation’s cheapest meats: See Judy Jones, “McDonald’s Takes British out of Burgers’, Observer , March 24, 1996.

The death of “Mad Max”: See Allison Pearson, “How We Swallowed the BSE Lie”, Evening Standard , October 4, 2000, and Kamal Ahmed, Antony Barnett, and Stuart Miller, “Focus: BSE: How the Government Betrayed the People”, Observer , October 29, 2000.

“constantly sought to prevent or delay”: Quoted in Le Monde, “Time to Make Some Radical Reforms in the Food Industry,” Manchester Guardian Weekly , May 30, 2001.

286 “might have had an adverse effect”: Quoted in ibid.

about 150 million pounds of the stuff: In 1989 Great Britain exported roughly 15,000 tons of potentially tainted feed, and exported an additional 8,500 to 9,000 tons per year until 1996. That adds up to roughly 75,000 tons over the eight‑year period. Cited in Steve Stecklow, “U.K.’s Exports May Have Expanded the Boundaries of Mad Cow Disease’, Wall Street Journal , January 23, 2001.

blocked publication of the EU report: See Peter Hadfield, “Ministry Bungle puts Japan at risk of BSE,” Sunday Telegraph , September 23, 2001.

“disposed of”: See ibid.

about a billion pounds of rendered cattle: Cited in Steve Secklow, “In Battling Mad Cow, Britain Spawns Heaps of Pulverized Cattle,” Wall Street Journal , January 8, 2001.

generates electricity by burning cattle: See Philip Pullela, “Mad Cow Scare on Front Burner around Europe,” Reuters , January 22, 2001.

287 BSE may easily cross the species barrier: See Bonn, “Healthy Carriers,” The Lancet , and Barry James, “‘Mad Cow’ Disease in Pigs and Sheep?” International Herald Tribune , August 31, 2000.

“All cannibalistic recycling”: Quoted in Jonathon Leake, “New BSE Outbreak Linked to Blood in Feed,” Sunday Times , September 24, 2001.

at least 60,000 other cattle: This figure was cited by Professor Jeffrey Almond, Transcript, “U.S. TSE Committee.”

“If you don’t look”: Quoted in John S. Long, “Nation Isn’t Doing Enough to Detect Mad Cow Disease, CWRU Experts Say,” Plain Dealer , May 6, 2001.

approximately 375 million cattle: Since 1990, about 34 million cattle have been slaughtered each year in the United States. See “The Texas Blues,” Leather , August 1998.

about 15,000 of them were tested for mad cow: See Megan Mulholland, “Wisconsin‑Based Renderer’s President Stands Firm on Safety of U.S. Feed,” Post Crescent , May 20, 2001.

a cattle herd roughly one‑thirtieth the size: Belgium has about 3 million cattle; the United States has about 100 million. See Terry Downs, “Mad Cow Disease Testing Reveals Widespread Infection in Europe,” Food Chemical News , January 22, 2001.

leading American manufacturers promise: See Tim Phillips, “Are Pets Being Reccled into Pet Food?” Petfood Industry , March/Aril 1992.

40,000 pounds of dead dogs and dead cats : Cited in Patrick White, “Canada Pet Food Firm Turns Back on Dog and Cat Meat,” Reuters , June 5, 2001.

“This food is healthy and good”: Quoted in ibid.

288 the most common source of animal protein in poultry feed: See Daniel Rosenberg, “Mad Cow Disease Concern Could Change Chicken Feed’, Wisconsin State Journal , May 5, 2001.

processes about 10 million pounds of chicken parts: Cited in “Multi‑million Dollar Facility to Help Tyson Ensure That Nothing Goes to Waste’” M2 Presswire , June 7, 1996.

the export needs of Nestlé: See John Vidal and Peter Hethrington, “Foot‑and‑Mouth Crisis: Food Lobby Forced PM into U‑Turn on Plan for Vaccination,” Guardian , September 8, 2001.

supplied the milk for McDonald’s milkshakes : Cited in Amanda Hall, “Whole‑meal Haskins: Chris Haskins, Maverick of Northern Foods and Express Dairies, Mixes a Healthy Serving of Politics with His Business,” Sunday Telegraph , June 14, 1998.

289 20 percent of its farmland: Cited in Paul Geitner, “Scare Helps Europe’s Organic Food,” AP Online , March 19, 2001.

“Things will no longer be”: Quoted in Michael Adler, “Greens Trumpet Their New Star, Agriculture Minister Kuenast,” Agence France Presse , March 11, 2001.

“Our Cows should get only water”: Quoted in “Germany Plans Radical Farm Reform – Food Must Be As Pure As Beer, Says Government,” Deutsche Presse‑Agentur , February 8, 2001.