2 March 2025

Don't be fooled by the extreme reponse to Foot And Mouth. This is NOT like BSE. BSE is fatal, wheras animals recover from Foot And Mouth. It's just that the animals can't be sold until they've recovered, so it's cheaper to kill them. And because Foot And Mouth is phenomenally contagious, they kill hundreds of thousands of disease-free animals as well, just in case.

Incidentally, the government (and farmers) tell us that Foot And Mouth can be carried on the wind for dozens, even hundreds of miles. Is this the same wind that the government (and farmers) say can't carry GM pollen more than 300 metres?

But most importantly, the difference between Foot And Mouth and BSE is there's a vaccine against Foot And Mouth. It costs about 10p an animal. So for 5m we could vaccinate every sheep and cow in the UK. Instead, we're burning these poor animals and then paying taxes to give farmers hundreds of millions of pounds in compensation.

Why didn't we vaccinate? Well we used to all across the European Union, but they changed the rules in the 90s so that vacinated animals and meat from them is not allowed to be exported (in case it's hosting the virus). The fact that it'd be cheaper to give the importer of UK meat vaccine for their animals seems to have passed them by.

This, of course, judges it as the politicians judge it; business, nothing more. Living, breathing, intelligent and self-aware animals are just commodity like corn or hairbrushes or bricks. We cannot imagine the suffering of these terrified animals as they watch others of their kind get herded and slaughtered fully conscious, screaming and writhing with sheets of blood issuing from their heads and necks covering the floor and the other animals.

The price of the farmers intensive practices is not only paid by the unfortunate animals in their custody, it is now paid by the wildlife too. The government's chief vet is threatening to kill deer, hedgehogs and other wildlife in the cause of eradicating this disease. Human beings can't catch it, and the animals get over it, or could be vaccinated. But that would kill the export trade in live animals, which is apparently what matters most.

Why is it that this disease spread so far? Why is it that a farmer from Devon sells animals at the other end of the country in Northumberland? Why is the UK exporting meat while importing meat?

It is because animal production plus transport generates more money than simple production. Capitalism reaps as it sows. How much more evidence do we need that the dollar is not the way to measure our well being? Every time a forest is felled there's an ecomomic boost. If that forest is left alone, no money is generated. Every oil spill, every bombing is good for business. When NATO started the criminal bombing of Belgrade, the first stocks to rise on their respective bourses were German and Dutch construction companies, and shares in arms manufacturer Boeing rose 24% over the course of the bombing campaign.

Burning as much fuel as you can, bombing buildings to rubble and stiimulating the demand for hospital treatment are all good for the economy. People producing their own food or helping each other for no financial reward is bad for the economy.

And it is in the name of economics all this is done. We're told that if we want to have less cruel slaughterhouses and less BSE and so on then we should 'be prepared to pay more for our food'. This is simply not true. They mean we should be prepared to pay more for meat. If the British were to pay much more for their meat, they would eat less of it, which would be healthier both because they were eating less, and because the product was better. They would also be inclined to eat more vegetarian meals, so they would be healthier, but also, richer. This is a real win-win for everybody. Everybody who doesn't have their money invested in meat profiteering.

The spread of these diseases, the suffering inflicted on the animals, the curtailment of our freedom of movement and the cost to the public purse are all done due to, and for the benefit of, meat profiteers. Worst among them are the supermarkets. Sure, buying your vegie food from them encourages them to stock more of it. It also gives them the profits to subsidise their huge vested interests in meat. When you see meat on special offer, where do you think the money's come from to pay for it? The profit on your veggie purchases.

Do I want to see more farmers going out of business because the meat industry collapses? No; I want to see them change their business. The demand for organic food in the UK outstrips supply many times over, yet the government spends more than ten times the amount of money just promoting GM than it does on research into organic farming. If a society suddenly stops wanting an industry then it should compensate and retrain the people involved in that industry, as we should have done with the miners when we closed coal mining.

With farming, it's not as if we don't want food anymore, we just want different food. We don't want as much meat, we don't want any GM, we want organic. Why are farmers not being helped to meet this demand?

This is where the Free Market idea truly collapses, because it fails to stand up even on its own terms; it is more profitable to continue as we are and artificially encourage demand for things people no longer want than to meet the real demands.

We must support those who are trying. Support your local organic veg box scheme, your local wholefood shop. If you don't like what happens in the meat industry, stop giving your money to people who prop it up.