FRANCE: Animal rights groups slam Halal meat cruelty

Consumers may unwittingly be eating Halal meat from animals which suffered excessive pain whilst being slaughtered, according to several animal rights groups who have organized a nationwide publicity poster campaign to denounce the practice.
“This animal is about to have its throat cut whilst conscious and it will suffer horribly. That is what ritual meat-killing is.” Those words can be read on posters in 50 French cities and they are why several French politicians have proposed that laws concerning Halal meal slaughtering and the meat’s labeling be changed.
Traditional French methods used in abattoirs are controlled by a government decree introduced in 1964 which stipulates that the animal must be unconscious before being killed. Methods used include a stun gun, the use of electric shock or the use of gas.
Traditional Jewish (Kosher) and Muslim (Halal) methods however insist that the animal be conscious when it is killed by having its throat slit, and these exceptions to the humane slaughter of animals are permitted by European Union legislation for reasons related to the freedom of religious expression. These exceptions are denounced by animal rights associations and figurehead animal rights defender Brigitte Bardot says that “I can no longer tolerate that conscious animals have their throats cut like in the Middle Ages in order to please a god whereas there are modern means which could avoid the animals’ suffering.”

Source: http://plus.lefigaro.fr/note/animal-rights-groups-slam-halal-meat-cruelty-20110120-379256

Airborne pathogens can induce mad cow disease, new findings suggest

Airborne prions are also infectious and can induce mad cow disease or Creutzfeldt-Jakob disorder, new findings suggest. This is the surprising conclusion of researchers at the University of Zurich, the University Hospital Zurich and the University of Tübingen. They recommend precautionary measures for scientific labs, slaughterhouses and animal feed plants. The prion is the infectious agent that caused the epidemic of mad cow disease, also termed bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), and claimed the life of over 280,000 cows in the past decades.
Transmission of BSE to humans, e.g. by ingesting food derived from BSE-infected cows, causes variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease which is characterized by a progressive and invariably lethal break-down of brain cells. It is known that prions can be transmitted through contaminated surgical instruments and, more rarely, through blood transfusions.

Source: Veterinary Sciences Tomorrow

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Dog Flu Pandemic Alert, Canine Flu

There is no doubt that the hand of the much talked about "bird flu" influenza virus recently became one of the "starlets" of global health. While many health experts, more or less spirit to generate concern, announced the early arrival of a pandemic, small animal veterinarians were professionally far enough outside the theme, if not directly influenced our work. However, a strong new alarm is sounding: in the U.S. and there are hundreds of cases of dogs infected with a strain of influenza, the same suffering horses.

Information on the Internet is vast. The Chronicle Veterinary contacted her after learning that in the latest edition of the North American Veterinary Conference, one of the most surprising news that was caused precisely that of the "Dog Flu".

There are few who are paying attention to the issue. In fact, nothing less than The New York Times, one of the world's most prestigious newspaper, published an article on September 22, 2005 titled "A new and deadly Canine Flu is detected in seven states."

According to this note, a highly contagious and sometimes deadly "Dog Flu" was detected in kennels and dog racing tracks around the U.S. The virus killed dogs even in suburban New York.

A researcher at the University of Florida, Dr. Cynda Crawford, said the virus spreads more easily where dogs live together or spend time in parks or nurseries, but can be spread on the street and even from men. "Workers of the kennels carried the virus to their homes," he said. The New York Times, it is unclear how many dogs have died from this flu, but it is estimated that 1% of those infected, a figure that grows by 10% between the pups and aging pets. In addition, Dr. Crawford added that because dogs have no natural immunity against influenza, virtually every animal exposed would be infected, and that the symptoms were often mistaken for "Kennel Cough". What are the signs of the flu? High fever, mucus, cough. Some animals may suffer pneumonia.

The strain is the H3N8 influenza. According to reports from virologists from Cornell University published in the journal Science, the gene sequence contains all segments of the virus affecting horses.

However, the variant equine / canine is very different from the H5N1 avian influenza and attacking men. So while no investigator ruled that in future the evil becomes a zoonosis, we do not see it as an imminent danger. It was not yet any reports of cats have been infected by contact with sick dogs.

Several scholars note that there is still no vaccine for Canine Flu, but believe it would not be so difficult to develop. Among other things, ensure that the Canine Flu is less lethal than parvovirus. Also, note that several laboratory tests showed that the new flu was successfully combated with two common antivirals in the U.S., amantadine and Tamiflu (the same one that seeks to use to fight bird flu), but the use of these drugs in dogs was not yet authorized.

The first sign of the "Dog Flu" was registered in 2004, when eight of the 24 greyhounds who lived in kennels for a racetrack in Jacksonville, Fla., died after flu-like symptoms and developed pulmonary hemorrhage. Then there were cases in Massachusetts, Arizona, West Virginia, Wisconsin, Texas and Iowa these racecourses and breeding states were forced to close for weeks for disinfection intense. Then came 35 cases in Ossining, a town near New York, and two of the dogs died. The last episode was in Chestnut Ridge, also near New York, where 88 dogs became ill and ten had to be hospitalized. It is estimated that U.S. there are about 50 million dogs.