latest on horse slaughter issue

[mightyhijames]

here's an article fromt the thoroughbred times today:


The Department of Agriculture announced Tuesday that slaughterhouses in the United States would be able to pay fees to allow federal inspections of horsemeat at their facilities.
The program, to begin March 10, will allow the three slaughterhouses in operation in the nation to continue to process horse meat this year. Last year, Congress passed a bill that prohibited the agriculture department from providing funds to inspect horsemeat at the facilities for a one-year period beginning in 2006.

According to estimates by the agriculture department, approximately 65,000 horses were killed in U.S. slaughterhouses last year.

In an announcement outlining the fee program, the department's Food Safety and Inspection Service said that the bill's prohibition on federal funds for inspections "does not eliminate the FSIS' responsibility under the [Federal Meat Inspection Act] to carry out post-mortem inspection of carcasses and meat at official establishments that slaughter horses."

The fees will be designed to cover the costs of the federal inspections, the FSIS announcement said.

Michael Markarian, the executive vice president of the Humane Society of the United States, said that fee-for-inspection program indicated that the inspection service and agriculture department were "ignoring the directives of Congress" and bowing to pressure from the slaughterhouses.

"By granting this eleventh-hour bid by the slaughterhouses to rewrite the law, the USDA is thumbing its nose at Congress. . . ." Markarian said.

[summerhorse]

Twas ever thus. Gee, who appointed that guy who heads the USDA...

[madelyn]

Let's look at this from an entirely different slant. Ever since Dollar Bill slashed all the funding for federal agencies, they have been fighting to regain their footing and their funding, while dealing with increased salaries, etc. The USDA needed more funds. Why not get everyone whipped up by "pretending" to ban horse slaughter (that'll tug the old heartstrings) when all along they just wanted the inspectors paid by the plants? USDA inspectors are already paid by slaughterhouses for other animals they process.. it was just a case of getting horses off the "livestock" list and onto the "exotic" list.. Because there is precedent set where the slaughterhouses pay for inspection of exotics, it didn't take much maneuvering to extend that to horses.

What I have a problem with is this. All along, if one simply read the legislation, there were NO WORDS in there about "banning the slaughter of horses." There was no declared intent for that. The legislation was simply to remove the funding for the USDA inspectors. Period.

Yet the media and the PETA folks gathered up in force and trumpeted to the world that the slaughter of horses in the US WAS BEING BANNED!! YAY!! TAKE UP THE FLAG!! And in so doing got manipulated into pushing through the legislation, whose sole purpose, it seems, was to get the inspectors paid by the slaughterhouses.

[summerhorse]

Only exotic animals are covered by this law, horses are covered under the regular livestock law which IS paid for by the US Gov. and will continue to be under at least the PRETENSE of protecting our food supply and export business. They are using the loophole that because horses are NOT excluded they are therefore included despite the fact that goats, sheep, hogs, cows and chickens are ALSO "not excluded" does this mean that now all THOSE plants have to pay for their inspectors? Of course not, it is just an end run for the big business to flaunt the will of the people who spoke loudly and distinctly GET THE HELL OUT OF THE USA HORSE KILLERS. But because somebody is in somebody's back pocket (always in DC) unless and until the Congress and Senate get their collective acts together and outright BAN the practice the slaughterhouses will fight tooth and nail. Did you know that the slaughter of horses is ILLEGAL in Texas? Guess where two of the three plants are? Apparently states have no rights anymore according to the courts because there is no federal ban on horse slaughter. SO that is what the horse communities goal HAS to be, getting a law ASAP banning the slaughter and export/transport of horses for slaughter. Canada ships boatloads of PMU babies over to Japan to be raised in feedlots for slaughter (well i guess at least THEY are controlling what drugs go into their systems...) . Any US ban has to include such language. I'm sure they will sneak them out but the harder and more expensive it is the less likely it will remain a profit making machine.

[kezeli]

[quote="summerhorse"]Only exotic animals are covered by this law, horses are covered under the regular livestock law which IS paid for by the US Gov. and will continue to be under at least the PRETENSE of protecting our food supply and export business. They are using the loophole that because horses are NOT excluded they are therefore included despite the fact that goats, sheep, hogs, cows and chickens are ALSO "not excluded" does this mean that now all THOSE plants have to pay for their inspectors? Of course not, it is just an end run for the big business to flaunt the will of the people who spoke loudly and distinctly GET THE HELL OUT OF THE USA HORSE KILLERS. But because somebody is in somebody's back pocket (always in DC) unless and until the Congress and Senate get their collective acts together and outright BAN the practice the slaughterhouses will fight tooth and nail. Did you know that the slaughter of horses is ILLEGAL in Texas? Guess where two of the three plants are? Apparently states have no rights anymore according to the courts because there is no federal ban on horse slaughter. SO that is what the horse communities goal HAS to be, getting a law ASAP banning the slaughter and export/transport of horses for slaughter. Canada ships boatloads of PMU babies over to Japan to be raised in feedlots for slaughter (well i guess at least THEY are controlling what drugs go into their systems...) . Any US ban has to include such language. I'm sure they will sneak them out but the harder and more expensive it is the less likely it will remain a profit making machine.[/quote]

Also someone had the idea that if a minmum $1000 selling fee was imposed at the auctions than that would hit the killer buyers in the pocket. What really gets me is the AVME, the AQHA, and various other agencies lending cridibilty to the issue buy calling this "a humane option" to rid people of injured/unwanted horses and spouting that the streets would be teaming with abused/starveing horses. Also the unknowing/ingnorant fans blameing the throughbred breeders as the largest contributers to the unwanted horse problem, when the stats say there are more QH and backyard breds in the slaghter population than throughbreds and the AQHA endorces it :evil: I am amazed at the vets especially and the population of Texas for not haveing the means or inclination to stop it in their state when they passed an anit-slaguther bill in the '40s

[summerhorse]

Yup the pro slaughter rhetoric is as inaccurate as it is disgusting. And the fact the AQHA (the leading producer of slaughter fodder) and the Am. Vet. ass. could SUPPORT such a brutal death shows that they are either heartless or just totally clueless of the slaughter procedure. While a good many Tbs and Stb. do go to slaughter. The last figure I had is a few years old but not much as really changed, maybe fewer racers in fact are going but there were about 7,000 TBs and a few more (9,000-10,000?) standardbreds from about 50,000 horses. So that means that the two racing breeds COMBINED still are only about 34% of the slaughter bound horses. Going by the rescue populations and the feedlots populations as well as the slaughterhouse sales the leading animals are QHs and QH mixes, PMU horses (drafters/draft mixes), backyard horses, pleasure horses, rodeo horses, mustangs (yeah mustangs complete with brands), racehorses, and the throwaways (old, infirm, crippled, blind, whatever that aren't even supposed to go ona truck). Included in the racehorses are the old broodmares and stallions and the culled foals/yearlings. (foals are usually kept back and fed for a while in feedlots). At least you can buy horses off the feedlots. they just want their money, they don't care where it comes from.

Everybody should put $1,000 reserve on their horses, min. $800, to make it non profitable to the killer buyers. If it isn't worth THAT either find a free home for it with a known person or rescue (i.e. checked out/references) or just humanely euthanize it and have the rendering plant haul it away. No horse deserves the bolt gun.

[kezeli]

I just went on another forum and tore it up with brutal facts(I hope I don't get baned) two members really think captive bolt is humane and were spouting UofC reference, what B@%%$&*#, I guess the new vet population is falling victim to that propaganda, wish they would put out a thinking vet instead of sheep :twisted:

[summerhorse]

No kidding, shoot all they have to do is WATCH the videos. How anyone can watch that and then think that is just A-Ok has got to be missing some major empathy genes...

[BJ]

I just went on another forum and tore it up with brutal facts(I hope I don't get baned) two members really think captive bolt is humane and were spouting UofC reference, what B@%%$&*#, I guess the new vet population is falling victim to that propaganda, wish they would put out a thinking vet instead of sheep

Vets aren't that stupid. They are just bought off. Same thing with the AQHA. They might have to redistribute the money if they were forced to take responsibility for the horses they create.

I guess there aren't that many classy folks like Penny Chenery, who stated at the Eqlipse Awards,

"WE BRING THESE HORSES INTO THE WORLD. WE SHOULD TAKE
THE RESPONSIBILITY TO SEE THAT WHEN THEY DIE, IT IS A
DIGNIFIED AND HUMANE DEATH."

She is in favor of the breeders and owners taking financial responsibility for a horse's retirement. I agree.

[BJ]

www.TheHorse.com has given people a link to post commentary to the USDA re: the USDA's plans to implement a special fee for services to benefit the horse slaughter plants and circumvent the recent ruling which would have halted horse slaughter in this country for human consumption.

Follow the link at the bottom of the article.

Suit Filed Over Horsemeat Inspections
by: Chad Mendell, Staff Writer
February 2006 Article # 6613

Animal rights groups and U.S. residents living near three horsemeat processing plants jointly filed suit against the USDA on Feb. 13, less than a week after USDA announced a program to allow fee-for-service inspections of horses at slaughter plants. The Appropriations Bill eliminated funding of USDA inspectors at these plants. The groups allege that allowing fee-based inspections for horsemeat goes against the Congressional intent of the Appropriations bill, which they said was intended to end horse slaughter in the United States. They filed the lawsuit in the Washington, D.C., U.S. District Court. For more information the USDA's proposed fee-for-service program see http://www.thehorse.com/viewarticle.aspx?ID=6599."The USDA's subversion of the law to appease the economically marginal and widely reviled horse slaughter industry is a blatant abuse of executive power, a violation of federal law, and an insult to the American people," said Wayne Pacelle, president and CEO of the Humane Society of the United States. However, according to Steven Cohen, USDA spokesperson, the bill did not affect the legality of horsemeat processing, but only eliminated funding for inspecting horsemeat. Cohen said the bill doesn't change the agency's legal responsibility to inspect horsemeat under the Federal Meat Inspection Act."The legal analysis supports the idea that the USDA is obligated under the law to perform these inspections, and we have an obligation to make sure the meat and carcasses are safe and wholesome," Cohen said.Other groups included in the suit are the Animal Welfare Institute, The Fund for Animals, Society for Animal Protective Legislation, Doris Day Animal League, the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, and the American Humane Association.

The USDA is accepting public comments regarding the fee-for-service program until March 10, when the program will be implemented. For more information on the program see
http://www.fsis.usda.gov/Frame/FrameRed ... -036IF.htm

AFTER CLICKING LINK ABOVE...scroll down until you come to the directed link within the legal document posted.

[kezeli]

Thank you for the link :) I just posted a rather strong letter I hope it gets read by someone. They seem to have forgotten the humane slaughter act and also the acts regarding humane transport of "livestock". The humane slaugther act does fall short even for our usual food animals as they are offten bled before being rendered unconcious do to the nature of the assembly line. But a captive bolt was not even designed for use on equine species. That bit about Texas haveing a law on the books from the '40s banning horse slaugther and THAT not being inforced really gets me :twisted:

[horsenuts]

Dogs are slaughtered in Asia on a dailey basis as dog meat is a favorite in that part of the world. Horsemeat is preferred in some parts of the world(europe... France in particualr). In America we like beef/chicken pork along with sheep/goat/rabbit and a few other exotics. Fact is flesh of one kind or another has been consumed by humans since recorded history and I don't see that ending anytime soon.

Horses have long been consumed in America. The Louis and Clark expedition ate horsemeat when nothing else was available and traded for dog whenever possible as they preferred dogmeat over the fish that the Columbia river provided.

Call me cold-hearted but I don't see where one animal should be preferred over another. They are all sentient beings and in fact the pig is one of the most intelligent... yet we kill the pig with nary a thought given save animal right activists. To defend only the horse in regards to slaughter is hypocritical in my world. While I am a flesh-eater myself I respect people who aren't(but that must include ALL flesh).

[YoTambien]

This is essentially the Public Comment letter that I sent in. The "Public View" for the comment letters makes many of them unreadable since html tags are not read, and paragraph breaks are uncertain at best. (Many thanks to JStark who posted the list of products and the FDA links on the Anti-Slaughter forum)



Congress passed legislation last year to end federal funding for USDA inspectors for horse slaughterhouses. The USDA recently approved a petition by the foreign owned slaughterhouses to allow them to privately pay inspectors, thus continuing the slaughter of American horses for the profit of foreign owned plants. Since the meat is exported, there is little these plants pay in the way of taxes and little that these plants contribute to the local economy. These plants offer only a few low-wage positions for dangerous work.

Many horse owners are unaware that horse slaughter exists in this country and are unaware of the potential fate that awaits their horse if they sell it or send their horse to an auction. In addition, stolen horses can wind up at a slaughterhouse, and the owner does not have enough time to contact the slaughterhouse to prevent their beloved and/or valuable horse from being slaughtered. What quality control system will ensure that stolen American owned horses are not slaughtered for the profit of the foreign owners of the slaughterhouse?

I ask how will these privately paid inspectors stop the slaughter of horses that have been given large doses of phenylbutazone within weeks of slaughter. This is a common substance that is given to performance horses. Thoroughbred racehorses can go from the finish line of a race to the slaughter line in a matter of days. What kind of quality control will prevent a human consumer from eating meat laced with Bute?

Horses destined for slaughter do not need to have a "Coggins" certificate. What kind of quality control will prevent a human consumer from eating meat from a horse with infectious equine anemia? In addition, since a "Coggins" certificate is not required to transport slaughter-bound horses, horses nearby any holding pens or transport routes can be put in jeopardy of contracting this fatal illness since the virus can be spread by mosquitoes and horseflies.

In addition to infectious equine anemia, what kind of quality control will prevent a human consumer from eating meat from a horse that was infected with West Nile Virus? The protein derived from "downer cattle" cannot be feed to ruminants, but there is NO PROHIBITION on "MAD COW" infected protein from being fed to horses. What quality control is in place to prevent a human consumer from eating meat from a horse that may be harboring the prions that cause Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy?

We have seen how the careless inspection in one slaughter house has effectively shut down the Japanese market again for U.S. beef exports. What would happen to the legitimate meat industry if it should be discovered that U.S. horse meat sold in Europe causes health problems?

Horses are not raised for food in this country. There is NO regard given to the safety of the meat for human consumption. Horses are bred, raised and trained to serve as a working partner or valued companion and NOT with the primary goal as a food animal. Slaughter is a betrayal of the trust that we demand from horses, and slaughter is a betrayal to consumers in Europe who believe they are purchasing a pristine product. Inspections of horsemeat only check for triginosis, and there is no verification that unsafe substances have not been administered. Current methods of transport and slaughter are unnecessarily cruel.

The meat is exported as a high priced delicacy for human consumption. The European Union has strict laws in place controlling the substances given to horses intended for slaughter. This has increased the cost of horsemeat in Europe, and the foreign owned slaughterhouses are able to slip in a cheaply purchased meat and sell it for high prices because of an overlooked loophole in the import certifications. This despite that the following are common substances given to almost all horses in the U.S. These are all substances that are labeled "NOT for use in horses intended for food."

http://www.fda.gov/OHRMS/DOCKETS/98fr/03-4741.htm
For animals, phenylbutazone is currently approved only for oral and injectable
use
in dogs and horses. Use in horses is limited to use in horses not intended for food.
There are currently no approved uses of phenylbutazone in food-producing animals.

http://www.fda.gov/OHRMS/DOCKETS/98fr/05-23295.htm
EQUIPOISE (boldenone undecylenate)

http://www.fda.gov/cvm/4402.htm#nada
Omeprazole (GastroGard®)

http://www.fda.gov/cvm/FOI/1529.htm
Generic Name: ketoprofen
Trade Name: Ketofen™

http://www.fda.gov/cvm/FOI/1488.htm
Generic Name: ivermectin
Trade Name: EQVALAN Liquid

http://www.fda.gov/cvm/FOI/1483.htm
Generic Name: xylaxine HCl
Trade Name: Xylazine HCl Injection

http://www.fda.gov/cvm/FOI/1479.htm
Generic Name: hyaluronate sodium
Trade Name: Synacid™

http://www.fda.gov/cvm/FOI/1466.htm
Generic Name: hyaluronate sodium
Trade Name: Hyalovet®

http://www.fda.gov/cvm/FOI/1463.htm
Generic Name: pyrantel tartrate
Trade Name: Strongid 48

http://www.fda.gov/cvm/FOI/1441.htm
Generic Name: 0.2% nitrofurazone dressing (water soluble) veterinary
Trade Name: NFZ Wound Dressing

http://www.fda.gov/cvm/FOI/1407.htm
Generic Name: luprostiol
Trade Name: Equestrolin™

http://www.fda.gov/cvm/FOI/1392.htm
Generic Name: Hyaluronate Sodium
Trade Name: Legend(TM) ™(Hyaluronate Sodium) Injectable Solution

http://www.fda.gov/cvm/FOI/1380.htm
Generic Name: Polysulfated Glycosaminoglycan (PSGAG)
Trade Name: Adequan® i.m.

http://www.fda.gov/cvm/FOI/1336.htm
Generic Name: clenbuterol hydrochloride
Trade Name: VENTIPULMIN® SYRUP

http://www.fda.gov/cvm/FOI/1322.htm
Generic Name: Tolazoline Hydrochloride, USP, Sterile Solution
Trade Name: Tolazine™Injection

http://www.fda.gov/cvm/FOI/920.htm
Generic Name: moxidectin
Trade Name: Quest™ moxidectin 2% Equine Oral Gel

http://www.fda.gov/cvm/FOI/882.htm
Generic Name: b -aminopropionitrile fumarate
Trade Name: BAPTEN® For Injection

http://www.bi-
vetmedica.com/product_sites/buscopan/reference.html
BUSCOPAN™

http://ecfr.gpoaccess.gov/cgi/t/text/te ... 1#21:6.0.1 .1.9.0.1.224
Ponazuril (Marquis)

http://www.betterchem.com/vet/albuterol.htm
Albuterol sulfate

Given this list of COMMONLY used substances that almost every horse in the United States is given at somepoint in its life, if not several several times or even daily, how can the USDA continue to allow the slaughter of horses for food? Is the USDA this unconcerned about the health of consumers? What faith can I have that the USDA can ensure a safe food supply if they allow these kind of substances into the human food chain?

[kezeli]

In responce to the poster regarding flesh is flesh, that is not really the point in my world. The point is that the method of slaguther used in the equine is not at all humane. I don't condone it under any case but that is purely an emotional reaction of coarse. If a method is devised that is humane it wouldn't sit quite as hard with me. Oh and by the way yes many cultures do eat dogs but as well the slaguther is less that humane.

[griff]

Yutombien

Thanks for your post which I believe supports sending horse meat to France

griff