Cows and calves were kept in pens and barns whose floors were filled with deep excrement, which caused foot and hoof problems and fostered disease. One steer was nearly blind, his eyes scarred from untreated pinkeye. Calves rescued from the facility had pneumonia, "manure scald," ringworm and parasites. Abscesses were common. As PETA's video shows, some of them burst and oozed pus even as cows were being milked.
Land O'Lakes "inspected" the Pennsylvania farm as recently as June 2009 and merely noted that there were areas "including the milking parlor walls "in need of cleaning; it approved the facility nonetheless.
As a result of PETA's investigation, the farm's owner and his son have been charged with cruelty to animals. PETA is also calling on Land O'Lakes to implement and enforce a 12-point animal welfare plan that would eliminate some of the worst abuses to cows raised for their milk.
But it won't eliminate all of them. As long as consumers continue to buy milk, butter, cheese and ice cream (even though supermarkets are full of delicious alternatives), animals will continue to suffer. Mother cows will continue to watch helplessly as their calves are taken from them again and again. They will continue to go lame from intense confinement amid waste and suffer from mastitis, an extremely painful udder infection caused by drugs and overmilking. And they will continue to be trucked to slaughter and ground up for burgers when their worn-out bodies are no longer of any use to farmers.
And that's what's wrong with dairy foods.
Dan Paden is a senior research associate in People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals' Cruelty Investigations Department, 501 Front St., Norfolk, VA 23510; http://www.PETA.org.
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