Hospitals Move to More Animal-Friendly Menus

Hospitals are trendsetters. Their purchasing decisions have a huge impact on the market and, since doctors and nurses are considered trusted sources, health care systems can influence personal decisions, too.

So it's good news that health care systems and organizations around the country are promoting meat-free meals and taking a stand against factory farms.

A coalition called Health Care Without Harm is promoting the Balanced Menus Challenge as part of a Healthy Food in Health Care initiative. When health care systems sign the pledge, they agree to reduce the amount of animal protein they serve by 20 percent over the course of a year.

Dr. Alex Hershaft, founder of Farm Animal Rights Movement, says that skipping meat one day a week saves five animals a year, or 300 to 400 animals in a lifetime. Multiply that meatless day by the hundreds, or even thousands, of employees, doctors, nurses, patients and visitors who come through a hospital's doors. That's a lot of animals saved from slaughter.

Health Care Without Harm provides a database of recipes, mostly vegetarian, to help hospitals with the reduction and assure food purchasers and patients that "meeting protein needs through plant-based proteins ... is easily achieved." In addition to the Balanced Menu Challenge and veg-friendly recipes, Health Care Without Harm also provides resources like Feeding Arsenic to Poultry: Is This Good Medicine? and tips on purchasing sustainably-raised meat.

For many hospitals, the commitment to reducing meat and finding more sustainable sources also means taking antibiotics off the menu. The concern over antibiotic-resistant bacteria has also led the Food and Drug Administration and the U.S. Department of Agriculture to admit that the rampant use of antibiotics on factory farms is a problem.

In addition to the health care systems that are demanding antibiotic-free meat, dozens of health-related organizations have endorsed the Preservation of Antibiotics for Medical Treatment Act, including the American Medical Association, the American Academy of Pediatrics and the American Academy of Family Physicians. PAMTA would limit the use of non-therapeutic use of antibiotics in farm animals. That means factory farmers would have stop pumping animals full of antibiotics to compensate for unsanitary conditions and poor diets.

These campaigns aren't touted as being anti-meat, but rather about bringing healthier food to hospitals while reducing costs and climate change. When it comes to food purchases, what's good for humans is good for the environment is good for animals.

This new trend in hospital purchasing won't shut down factory farms tomorrow, but it's a step in the right direction to make people and animals healthier. And as health care systems make animal-friendly changes, others will follow.

Photo credit: FotoosVanRobin