Industry Panics: New Diseases, Labor Exploitation, and Cattle Market Collapse | Rising Anxieties

The animal agriculture industry’s nightmares are our fuel this week as Mariann dives into the poultry sector’s desperate scramble to combat the mysterious avian metapneumovirus that’s dethroned bird flu as their top concern. Meanwhile, Big Ag’s dystopian push to expand the H-2A visa program threatens to create a permanent underclass of “temporarily permanent” workers with virtually no rights—because nothing says “ethical industry” like needing indentured servitude to stay profitable.

This episode explores:

• How the poultry industry’s new top threat—avian metapneumovirus (AMPV)—is devastating turkey and broiler operations while raising concerns about potential human transmission
• The meat and dairy industries’ alarming push to exploit the H-2A visa program by creating a permanent class of vulnerable workers with few rights and no economic mobility
• Why “improving livability” is the industry’s euphemism for preventing animals from dying before they can be profitably slaughtered
• How the New World Screwworm parasite is causing cattle futures to collapse as it spreads through Mexico toward the US border
• The EU’s postponed decision on plant-based food labeling restrictions and new research showing protein-focused marketing could increase plant-based food uptake by over 100%

 

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