Sick, Suffering Pigs: Brought to You by World's Largest Pork Producer

Before slicing into your Christmas ham, check the package. If the pork came from Smithfield Foods, you may want to stick to the side dishes this year.

The Humane Society of the United States (HSUS) recently wrapped up an undercover investigation (pdf) of a Waverly, V.A. factory farm owned by Murphy-Brown. Murphy-Brown, a subsidiary of Smithfield Foods, is the world's largest pork producer, bringing more than 17 million pigs to slaughter every year. The conditions one investigator observed are enough to make even the most devout meat-eater back away from the bacon.

The Waverly breeding plant's instances of sickness and animal abuse are truly stomach-turning. An investigator observed pigs being thrown into dumpsters alive and prematurely born piglets falling through grates into manure pits. In one case, an employee used an unclean razor to lance a basketball-sized abscess off a pig's neck. The HSUS employee never once saw a veterinarian on-site throughout the entire investigation period. (For all the harrowing details, read the full report here).

While talk of abscesses and manure-soaked piglets is certainly disturbing enough, the biggest problem at the factory farm was the use of gestation crates. The factory farm keeps sows locked into cages so small they can barely move. These pigs get locked up, bred over and over, and spend their entire lives in the confines of the crate. The investigator observed blood caked on the crates' bars from where pigs bit incessantly due to stress and poor conditions. Some pigs displayed open, festering sores from where crate protrusions poked them or bars rubbed up against their skin.

While the animal rights abuses are enough to make even the biggest Grinch give up his holiday ham, these kinds of conditions also breed food safety issues. Keeping pigs crammed so close together with manure everywhere is an easy way to spread disease. The high incidence of injuries, open sores, blood, infections, and other nasties seriously endangers pigs, but also pork consumers.

Folks from animal rights' advocates to sustainable foodies to public health experts are all calling for an end to the use of gestation crates, and that pressure is starting to pay off: The European Union and seven U.S. states have already outlawed gestation crates. New Zealand and Australia are currently phasing out the use of restrictive animal cages, while corporations like Burger King, Wendy's, Quiznos, Sonic, Safeway, Winn-Dixie, and other companies are drastically cutting back on their use of pork from suppliers that use gestation crates. Maxwell Foods raises its pigs without gestation crates, while Cargill cut back on its use of the cages by 50 percent.

Smithfield Foods — which owns Murphy-Brown — committed in 2007 to phase out its use of gestation crates by 2017. Then last year, the company scaled back its promise.

Consumer pressure has already pushed so many governments and corporations to end the use of gestation crates. Smithfield Foods — and other factory farm owners — won't adopt more sanitary, humane, pig-raising methods unless we push them to do so. Join the HSUS in its battle against gestation crates. Sign the non-profit's petition asking Smithfield Foods to agree to its 2007 promise and eliminate its use of gestation crates by 2017.

Photo credit: The Humane Society of the United States