Mexico Outbreak Traced to ‘Manure Lagoons’ at Pig Farm
April 28th, 2009This is an interesting story. Of course, it doesn’t mention the fact that, back in February, Panasonic knew that a pandemic flu event was going to happen.
Via: Times Online:
The first known case of swine flu emerged a fortnight earlier than previously thought in a village where residents have long complained about the smell and flies from a nearby pig farm, it emerged last night.
The Mexican Government said it initially thought that the victim, Edgar Hernandez, 4, was suffering from ordinary influenza but laboratory testing has since shown that he had contracted swine flu. The boy went on to make a full recovery, although it is thought that at least 148 others in Mexico have died from the disease, and the number is expected to rise.
News of the infected boy is expected to create controversy in Mexico because the boy lived in Veracruz state, home to thousands of farmers who claim that their land was stolen from them by the Mexican Government in 1992. The farmers, who call themselves Los 400 Pueblos – The 400 Towns – are famous for their naked marches through the streets of Mexico City.
The boy’s hometown, La Gloria, is also close to a pig farm that raises almost 1 million animals a year. The facility, Granjas Carroll de Mexico, is partly owned by Smithfield Foods, a Virginia-based US company and the world’s largest producer and processor of pork products. Residents of La Gloria have long complained about the clouds of flies that are drawn the so-called “manure lagoons” created by such mega-farms, known in the agriculture business as Confined Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs).
It is now known that there was a widespread outbreak of a powerful respiratory disease in the La Gloria area earlier this month, with some of the town’s residents falling ill in February. Health workers soon intervened, sealing off the town and spraying chemicals to kill the flies that were reportedly swarming through people’s homes.
A spokeswoman for Smithfield, Keira Ullrich, said that the company had found no clinical signs or symptoms of the presence of swine influenza in its swine herd or its employees working at its joint ventures anywhere in Mexico. Meanwhile, Mexico’s National Organisation of Pig Production and Producers released its own statement, saying: “We deny completely that the influenza virus affecting Mexico originated in pigs because it has been scientifically demonstrated that this is not possible.”
According reports gathered on the website of James Wilson, a founding member of the Biosurveillance Indication and Warning Analysis Community (BIWAC), about 60 per cent of La Gloria’s 3,000-strong population have sought medical assistance since February.
“Residents claimed that three pediatric cases, all under two years of age, died from the outbreak,” wrote Mr Wilson. “However, officials stated that there was no direct link between the pediatric deaths and the outbreak; they said the three fatal cases were isolated and not related to each other.”
The case of the four-year-old boy was announced yesterday by Mexico’s Health Minister, Jose Angel Cordova, at a press conference that was briefly interrupted by an earthquake. “We are at the most critical moment of the epidemic. The number of cases will keep rising so we have to reinforce preventive measures,” he said, adding that in addition to the 149 deaths another 2,000 had been hospitalised with “grave pneumonia”, although at least half of that number had since made a full recovery.
Mr Cordova went on to say that there have been no new cases detected in La Gloria but epidemiologists want to take a closer look at pigs in Mexico as a potential source of the outbreak.
As the desease spread Greater Mexico City, usually a chaotic, traffic-snarled megatropolis of 22 million – where braised pork or carnitas, is prepared at taco stands on busy street corners – remained at a virtual standstill yesterday.
A majority of people are now wearing surgical masks and or plastic gloves in public. Airport terminals are deserted. Schools and government offices are closed and will remain so until at least early May – creating a childcare crisis for millions of working parents.
Many Mexicans are fearing the economic devastation caused by the health emergency as much as they are the prospect of swine flu. Adding to the misery, several countries including China have banned imports of live pigs and pork products from Mexico (and parts of the US) in spite of claims by farming trade groups that it is impossible to catch the virus from cooked meat.
If you found this story interesting, perhaps you recall this other one:
Big factory pig farms are some of America’s worst polluters
http://www.boingboing.net/2007/01/20/big-factory-pig-farm.html
It appears to be one of the more extensively updated and discussed articles on boingboing.net; a quote that stuck with me:
“In another instance, a worker who was repairing a lagoon in Michigan was overcome by the fumes and fell in. His fifteen-year-old nephew dived in to save him but was overcome, the worker’s cousin went in to save the teenager but was overcome, the worker’s older brother dived in to save them but was overcome, and then the worker’s father dived in. They all died in pig shit.”
I guess this vindicates Joel Salatin´s point about epidemic risks originating from big ag.
@pdugan
Yep, exactly! I had the privelege of attending a talk by Joel Salatin last week. The way he raises and uses the pig in his farm operation is phenomenal. I think his book on that is “Pig Fat, Cow Happy” (mot sure).
Joel Salatin has it down to a science – the use of pigs to dig up the free range cow manure while they are housed in the barns, plowing the land,etc.
He also talked about how and chicken, pig and beef production in big agriculture has been moved out the village into the outskirts of (wherever) because of the SMELL. He said that because of the way big Ag produces meat – the SMELL requires big AG to move it out of the village. And thus we lose our connection from food to table.
Its pretty sickening to think that under his farming methods – I think I said he “processes” 50 pigs a year. Consider the plant in Mexico – almost a million. Pretty disgusting.
http://diggingthroughthedirt.blogspot.com/2009/04/mexican-officials-trace-swine-flu-to.html
Just imagine the stench from this place! Its enough to give me the flu!
I wanted to briefly describe Salatin’s use of pigs and chickens(!) in raising free range beef.
1. Salatin has a large farm in Virginia, they cut lumber from the farm and then chip up all of the branches for wood chips.
2. The wood chips are spread on the barn floor; the cows poop on the wood chips, and then Joel etal sprinkle a layer of dried corn on the poop. This process goes on all winter. 3-4 months.
3. When the cows go out to pasture in the spring the pigs come into the barn and they dig through several feet of this “mash” to get to the corn, thus fluffing up the floor of the “stable.”
4. This dry product is then spread over the fields for fertilizer. Of course the manure is fully composted by then, a dry “fluff” with minimal odor ( I did something similar with my chicken’s poop this winter and truly – when mixed with dried pine and cedar “needles” it this compost has a slight whiff to it). Not a stench.
5. Wherever the cows range, the portable chicken ccops follow, chickens of course, loving to eat the bugs that land on the cow patties. And of course, those chickens lay a lot of eggs.
6. This brief synopsis does not even include how the pigs are used to clear the land. Salatin has it down to a science – how much land, how many pigs for how long to till the soil.
Salatin did say that his method sequesters so much CO2 that if all people raised their animals this way – well, he didn’t exactly say that it would correct global warming, but then again maybe hid did!
Compared to Salatin, an almost milliom pig operation with lagoons (ever smelled the air when a farmer spreads raw manure on their fields? – that’s bad enough – but lagoons?) its no wonder that there are a gazillion flies and people are developing respiratory diseases.
I’m not going to stop eating pork – I know my farmer and how he raises his meat. I’m wasn’t planning on buying any Smithfield ever, but this just reinforces not buying from someone I know.
Yup. I want to add the most brilliant part about Salatin´s system, he feeds the cows bits of corn in their winter hay which they don´t digest, and the pigs can smell that morsel amidst the feces and they dig through it to get at these fermented kernals. The areation this digging introduces amplifies the composting process by introducing a new micriorganisms to each cubic centimeter. Pretty brilliant from an engineering/design perspective, as well as an enviro-ag perspective.
“he feeds the cows bits of corn in their winter hay which they don´t digest”
this is really interesting. cows are ruminant animals. they should be eating pasture and green matter. not dried maize, soy beans or other cereals. but the idea of putting a small amount of corn to pass through their system sounds smart. i was listening to a nz organic dairy farmer on the radio the other day (there are way too few of these) and he said he feeds his cows fresh sweetcorn ears in the summer in the morning and then they go out and graze on pasture at their leisure. no dry feed at that time of year. and get this, his big secret was producing hay that was not compressed into bales so it had a higher moisture content. so he just had a huge hay stack in his barn, which the cows loved. and people came from miles around offering to buy his hay–like gold they said.
I don’t think Salatin feeds ANY corn to the cows, but spreads the corn on the foor for the pigs.