“Bird flu, Swine flu, Mad cow (disease) are examples from viruses that came from animal industries, so we have to make the connection (between meat and health),” Adit Romano, the co-founder of the Freedom Farm Sanctuary in Israel, tells The Animal Reader.
With her co-workers, she started an online petition to have authorities label meat products as dangerous for your health -just as tobacco and other harmful substances are labeled as dangerous to public health.
“Smoking cigarettes used to be a popular habit and a social habit, until not so long ago. Once the authorities started warning about the health risks in smoking, people were able to make more conscious decisions,” she says.
“Here at the Freedom Farm Sanctuary, we deeply believe knowledge is power, and only when we know, we can make a conscious decision,” Romano continues.
“It is the authorities’ responsibility to provide this kind of information and knowledge so we as a population will be aware of the health risks of consumption of animal products,” Romano explains.
“The situation in animal farming, lack of hygiene, crowding, genetic modifying, antibiotics, all this is spreading the danger of viruses, health problems and pandemics. Most of the population don’t know it, and they need to know.”
She sees the current situation in the world as an opportunity for change: “Sometimes we need an extreme situation in order to make an extreme change.”
When enough people have signed the petition, they will hand it to the United Nations and the World Health Organization to emphasize that there is a public demand to warn people of the dangers of eating meat.
Far from the eye is far from the heart
“We don’t have cows, sheep, turkeys, we have Shay, Thomer, Gali, Angela we have individuals here and every one of the animals on the farm is a celeb that people are following. Who likes who, Nina the dog likes to play with Alex the calf, Nina likes to play with Alex,” Romano says about the animals at the sanctuary.
She explains that only when you are close to these animals and see them as individuals, you will really understand that they need our protection: “We say ‘far from the eye is far from the heart.”
Almost 3,000 people have signed the petition so far. You can sign the petition here.
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