Disease
Below you will find links to articles and videos explaining the connection between animal agriculture and the spread of diseases.
Main links
Meat-eating creates risk of new pandemic that ‘would make Covid look like a dress rehearsal’
“Experts from both the UN and the European Food Safety Authority have previously identified industrial animal farming as the cause of most new infectious diseases in humans in the past decade, and have likewise warned it risks starting new pandemics.”
We have to wake up: factory farms are breeding grounds for pandemics
Covid-19’s history is not yet fully known, but the links between animal and human health could not be clearer
Industrial animal farming has caused most new infectious diseases and risks more pandemics, experts warn
“Industrial animal farming has caused most new infectious diseases in humans in the past decade – and risks starting new pandemics as animal markets have done, experts are warning.”
TED Talk: What do we do when antibiotics don’t work any more?
“Most [raised for] meat animals are given antibiotics every day of their lives, not to cure illnesses but to fatten them up and to protect them against the factory farm conditions they are raised in.”
The next pandemic could come from our farms (VOX)
“Factory farms are also factories for new viruses… humans have made it very easy for a nasty virus to emerge. And actually, it's happened already.”
The Antibiotic Apocalypse Explained (Kurzgesagt)
“So many animals are given antibiotics … we have created more and more bacteria that are resistant to antibiotics.”
Further reading
How factory farms are making the antibiotics we use less effective against disease
“As bacteria become resistant to all of our antibiotics because of our overuse in animal production and in human medicine, we are not going to be able to save people the way we have in the past”
World’s top banks must stop funding factory farming to prevent future pandemics, say campaigners
“Experts from both the UN and the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) have pinpointed animals or food of animal origin as a starting point for emerging diseases.”
Livestock infectious diseases and zoonoses (2009)
”…approximately 75 per cent of ‘new’ human pathogens reported in the past 25 years have originated in animals…”
Antibiotic Resistance
“Despite scientists' warnings, antibiotic prescriptions in many countries continue to soar and antibiotic use in farming is at record levels. As a result, doctors are now seeing infections they can no longer treat. Are we facing the end of modern medicine?”
The Animal-Human Interface and Infectious Disease in Industrial Food Animal Production (2008)
“…zero risk is virtually impossible to achieve in farmed livestock populations, even in highly developed country settings.”
Industrial Livestock Production and Global Health Risks (PDF)
“…three out of four emerging pathogens affecting humans over the past ten years have originated from animals or animal products…”
lifegate.com
How factory farming breeds deadly viruses and epidemics
Factory farming conditions and antibiotic-resistant pathogens emerging as a result of them pose an existential threat to humans in the form of zoonotic diseases.