My mother was recently visiting with a friend. They got around to talking about their kids and she mentioned that Jane and I have been vegan for awhile, and that we've been blogging about our vegan experiences. My mom, who is not vegan by the way (hi mom!), explained veganism to her friend and discussed the cruelty perpetrated on the animals we, as a society, eat. (Go mom!) My mom expressed that it made her sad, to which her friend replied, "I don't care, I like meat." Wow. I know others have talked about experiencing this, but so far, the worst I've heard is, "I don't want to know, I still want to eat meat...."

If the environmental reasons aren't enough, here's a little something I've been reading about which should get those people who like meat to reconsider, at least the beef eaters.

I've been reading Thanking the Monkey and on page 192 Karen Dawn writes

How rampant is mad cow disease? We don't know. A study at Yale found that of forty-six patients clinically diagnosed with Alzheimer's, six were proven to have Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD) at autopsy. (Ms. Dawn cites Guy McKahann et al., Alzheimer Disease and Associated Disorders 1989 - pages 100-109.) Other studies have shown that mad cow prions can cause a disease with a molecular signature indistinguishable from sporadic CJD. Therefore there is no way to determine if the many deaths from CJD misdiagnosed as Alzheimer's are actually linked to mad cow disease. (Ms. Dawn cites Michael Greger, MD, "Could Mad Cow Disease Already Be Kliling Thousands of Americans Every Year?" CommonDreams.org, January 7, 2004.) So we cannot know how widespread mad cow disease is in the United States, or whether humans are infected. It seems that the government is in no rush to help us find out.

Yikes! Then there's always this blurb from the National Institutes of Health page on CJD.

The appearance of the new variant of CJD (nv-CJD or v-CJD) in several younger than average people in Great Britain and France has led to concern that BSE may be transmitted to humans through consumption of contaminated beef. Although laboratory tests have shown a strong similarity between the prions causing BSE and v-CJD, there is no direct proof to support this theory.

Source: National Institute of Neurological Disorders (NIH)

The more I read, the happier I am that I'm vegan.

We've been hearing about the potential dangers of methane gasses for awhile now. Discover magazine published an article last week stating that "Methane is a paradox. It increases global warming at the same time that it promises abundant alternative energy." Regardless of the potential as an alternative energy source, most of us regard methane gas as a problem. But I think we'd be better served recommending a reduction in beef/milk consumption than trying to figure out how to reduce the methane emissions given off by cattle. Bossie (generic cow's name) would probably agree.

I used to be an avid fan of The Simpsons. I still like the show, and watch the reruns often, but I don't watch it nearly as much as I used to. That doesn't stop me from quoting the show however. One of my favorite quotes is from the Episode "Lisa The Vegetarian."

Homer: Are you saying you're never going to eat any animal again? What about bacon?
Lisa: No.
Homer: Ham?
Lisa: No!
Homer: Pork chops?
Lisa: Dad, those all come from the same animal!
Homer: Heh heh heh. Ooh, yeah, right, Lisa. A wonderful, magical animal.

Most of my friends and family members are omnivorous. Many of them believe they are doing the "right" thing by eating organic foods. I've put right in quotations, because right is a subjective term, and organic is perceived as being a better choice than conventionally produced foods. However, it appears this isn't necessarily the case, for pork at least.

“Animal-friendly, outdoor farms tend to have a higher occurrence of Salmonella, as well as higher rates of parasitic disease,” said lead study author Wondwossen Gebreyes, associate professor of veterinary preventive medicine at Ohio State University.

Site: The PigSite.com

Wondwossen Gebreyes and colleagues at Ohio State University in Columbus tested US pigs for antibodies - telltale signs of infection - to pathogens that can also affect humans. They found traces of Salmonella in 39 per cent of pigs raised in standard indoor pens and routinely given antibiotics, but in 54 per cent of organic pigs raised outdoors without the drugs.

This poses a dilemma, says Gebreyes: giving pigs routine antibiotics favours antibiotic-resistant bacteria, but not giving them drugs means more animals carry Salmonella, which causes a million cases of food poisoning a year in the US alone.

Site: New Scientist Magazine

It gets even better... Gebreyes' team found traces of Toxoplasma in 7 percent of free-range animals but only 1 percent of conventional pigs. They also found two organic pigs infected with Trichinella. This is particularly troubling as Trichinella is virtually non-existent in livestock in the the US and Europe, although it is still found in wildlife populations. Finding this parasite in two pigs of the 600 tested is 23 times its average frequency in US pigs.

Any way you slice it, it looks like the "magical animal" isn't so wonderful. If you eat conventionally raised pork, you are contributing the overuse of antibiotics, pollution, and a more inhumane treatment of animals (among other things). If you eat "organic" pork, you are potentially exposing yourself to bacterial infection, contributing to the contamination of groundwater with pathogens such as Salmonella, and contributing to a slightly less inhumane treatment of pigs (among other things). The costs of eating meat are simply too high.

Over the last few weeks we've been hearing about salmonella in our tomatoes. Here's some more news that's disconcerting. Apparently washing produce doesn't necessarily remove salmonella. According to Lauran Neergaard, AP Medical Writer, if a tomato is warm and the water rolling over its surface is cold, then the fruit will absorb that water through any opening in the skin including the stem scar. If there is salmonella present on the tomato skin, it can enter the fleshy part of the tomato and the bacteria multiplies. Ms. Neergaard suggests we should wash our tomatoes, but not in cold water.

To guard against salmonella washed into the water in turn being sucked into the tomatoes, producers often keep wash-water 10 degrees warmer than the incoming crop, says food-safety scientist Keith Schneider of the University of Florida...

In fact, salmonella may be particularly hard to prevent in a variety of crops because birds, reptiles and amphibians carry it - the same reason children should wash their hands after handling a turtle, iguana or frog. The tomato industry's guidelines already advise surrounding fields with bare soil "buffer zones" to discourage reptiles.

This is the 14th salmonella outbreak associated with tomatoes since 1990.

The FDA has launched a Tomato Safety Initiative to learn more about how salmonella gets onto and inside tomatoes. Industry practices in Virginia and Florida (the origin of several previous outbreaks) are being studied and Florida's agriculture department will begin enforcing so-called "tomato best practices" on July 1st. The FDA is also asking for the authority to set preventative controls for growers and suppliers of foods linked to repeated outbreaks of serious illness, such as tomatoes and leafy greens. Congress hasn't yet acted on that request.

Ms. Neergaard doesn't mention groundwater contamination as an issue, as discussed in this New Scientist article:

The bacteria probably come from groundwater contaminated with animal faeces, he says. Once Salmonella gets on and into a tomato, the fruit acts like an incubator. Bacteria divide even in the cool temperatures of packing houses. "If you get a few samples into the internal tissue, then they will grow for sure."

At the moment there don't seem to be any clear cut answers as to how to prevent this from happening. But for now, wash your tomatoes in warm water.