They Are Euthanising Livestock In The Us

[pastafreak]

https://www.wsj.com/articles/pork-industry-usda-discuss-euthanizing-hogs-after-coronavirus-closes-plants-11588015611

Yet the grocery shelves are empty in some places from what I've read. Oh, and beef is being imported from Namibia.
I fear social unrest.

[Gromit]

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/apr/29/millions-of-farm-animals-culled-as-us-food-supply-chain-chokes-up-coronavirus

[Gromit]

Animals are a crop, and the longer you have to feed and employ people to look after them, the more they cost to produce.
If slaughter houses are shut, and the animals cannot be killed there, then they have to be killed on the farms, to save money.

Not sure about the word ‘Euthanising’ in the title.
These animals were due to be killed in slaughter houses and are now being killed on farmsteads. No more animals will have died than would have anyway.

[pastafreak]

They may have been meant to die anyway...but this way they are probably wasted unless used in other ways such as pet food.
I agree euthanized may not be the best term...it implies...to me anyway...mercy.

[Gromit]

The timing is coincidence.
It has taken 18 years Of negotiations for Namibia to Import to the US. The first 25 tonnes went to Philadelphia in mid April before Covid-19 was a problem.

// The arid southern African nation, known for free-range, hormone-free beef, is set to export 860 tonnes of various beef cuts in 2020 to the United States, rising to 5,000 tonnes by 2025. //

[jno]

meanwhile Trump has cut off funding for a study into how the virus crossed into humans, seemingly because he thinks it's a Chinese plot.

https://www.politico.com/news/2020/04/27/trump-cuts-research-bat-human-virus-china-213076

[Gromit]

That should have been mid February.