Another Downer Cow Abuse Video Comes To The Surface
The Humane Society of the United States(HSUS) has released a new video allegedly depicting downer cattle being abused at a livestock auction in New Mexico.
The video allegedly depicts downer cattle being subjected to electric prods, dragged by a chain and otherwise mistreated at the Portales Livestock Auction in Portales, N.M., according to the HSUS.
It was the sixth livestock facility this year ensnared in video depictions of animal cruelty in the ongoing HSUS campaign to expose what it calls “widespread abuse of livestock across the country... This gross mistreatment of spent dairy cows should turn your stomach, and they have been uncovered in location after location."
USDA Secretary Ed Schafer called the situation “unfortunate” and deplorable, adding that the weakened conditions of the animals would have prevented their delivery to a slaughter facility.
“Furthermore, they would not have passed ante-mortem inspection by the highly trained Food Safety Inspection Service inspection program personnel. Simply put, the condition of these cattle would prohibit them from even entering the first phase of a multi-phased process of approving cattle for slaughter,” he says.
“Of the nearly 34 million cattle that were slaughtered last year, under 1,000 cattle that were re-inspected were actually approved by the veterinarian for slaughter. This represents less than 0.003% of cattle slaughtered annually. However, to eliminate further misunderstanding of the rule and, ultimately, to make a positive impact on the humane handling of cattle, it is sound policy to simplify this matter by initiating a complete ban on the slaughter of downer cattle that go down after initial inspection.”
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