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Food Animal Vaccines: Big Money and Big Risks

cattle management

Most people are aware of Big Pharma’s global human vaccine franchise facilitated by business deals with governments and its attempt to silence skepticism about vaccine safety that could harm profits from sale of vaccines.1 2 Less well known is the existence of a lucrative food animal vaccine franchise, which is seldom mentioned in the mainstream press. Perhaps that is because the breadth of livestock diseases and types of vaccines given to food animals could kill people’s appetites, especially if the information was included on food labels.

Selling veterinary vaccines for animals that humans eat (cattle, pigs, poultry, fish) and human companion animals (cats, dogs, horses) is a big business. Financial forecasts predict it will be a $11.55 billion global market by 2025.3

Merck Leader in Animal Vaccine Sales

For example Merck & Co., which is a leader in sales of both human4 and animal vaccines, markets 49 vaccines for poultry alone.5 Those vaccines were created to prevent or control the spread of diseases like fowl pox, turkey coryza, bursal disease, coccidiosis, laryngotracheitis, hemorrhagic enteritis, avian encephalomyelitis, salmonella and E. coli.

Merck markets at least 25 vaccines for cattle diseases6 and many vaccines for pigs, including Argus® SC/ST Avirulent Live Culture, which is “an aid in the prevention of pneumonia, diarrhea, septicemia and mortality caused by Salmonella choleraesuis and as an aid in control of disease and shedding of Salmonella typhimurium.”7 The global vaccine manufacturing giant even markets vaccines for salmon bred on fish farms (aquaculture).8

Infections Kill Animals in Industrial Factory Farms

The routine vaccination of healthy animals that are grown for human consumption has become the norm in modern agriculture for the same reason that antibiotics are now routinely given to farm animals. On the Eco Farming Daily website, veterinarian Hubert J. Karreman explains that routine administration of antibiotics to animals on large farms is due to the “high concentration of animals in one location, whether it is a forty- to fifty-cow tie stall in a stone barn or a four hundred– to four thousand–cow free-stall system.9

Animals crowded together on industrial (“factory”) farms creates a breeding ground for disease. The underreported U.S. porcine epidemic diarrhea virus, which causes dreaded avian and porcine influenza pandemics on factory farms, killed one-tenth of all pigs in the U.S. between May 2013 and September 2014.10

In Ovo Vaccination: What Are the Risks?

More than 90 percent of broiler chickens in the U.S. are vaccinated “in ovo” according to 2018 research published in Veterinary Research,11 meaning that chicks are vaccinated as embryos.

At the hatchery, the vaccines are injected directly into the embryo or into the amniotic cavity at around day 18 or 19 of embryonic development. Systems to mass vaccinate embryos at hatcheries in this manner have been used for twenty years and the most common vaccinations are for three poultry diseases: Marek’s, Gumboro and Newcastle.

There are plenty of reported risks associated with these poultry vaccines.

This is what the Veterinary Research authors have reported:

It has been shown, for instance, that if Marek’s disease vaccine is accidentally deposited into the air cell or allantoic fluid, adequate protection is not achieved. The stage of embryonic development can have profound effects on vaccine safety and efficacy. One study, reported that vaccination of 10–12 day-old embryos with herpes virus of turkeys (HVT) led to pronounced lesions and embryonic deaths, while vaccination on days 16 did not cause detectable lesions.

Embryonic age at vaccination has also been shown to be correlated with antibody titers. Maternal antibody titers actually increase after the typical age for in-ovo vaccinations and peak just after hatch. This can interfere with proper vaccine responses. However, evidence suggests that some vaccine strains are more affected by maternal antibodies than others. Deliberate vaccine development may therefore limit the often disruptive effects that can be caused by maternal antibodies.

A Mycoplasma gallisepticum vaccine for in-ovo vaccination of layer chickens has also recently been evaluated, even though high chick losses at hatch were reported for the medium and high doses of the vaccine that were investigated.

It is no surprise that in ovo vaccination allows for other sorts of “Brave New Foods.” For example, in ovo grafting in which small pieces of tissue from a different animal can replace similar size tissue inside the egg can be performed in ovo, although “heavy bleeding may prevent success.” The shell “is then sealed with adhesive tape and incubation is resumed,” write researchers in Practical Aspects of Poultry Vaccination.12

Are You Eating Meat and Drinking Milk from Cloned Animals?

Since the 1980s, scientists have been experimenting with creating poultry chimeras – defined as animals composed of different cell populations from more than one fertilized egg.13 While clones, transgenic animals and chimeras are no longer rare, the potential risks of consuming cloned animal products are seldom discussed by journalists writing for mainstream news outlets.

In fact, few Americans are aware that for more than a decade, they have been eating FDA-approved meat and drinking milk from cloned animals and their offspring, while the European Union prohibits animal cloning and purchase of food products derived from cloning animals.14 15 In a published response to public comments regarding the FDA’s 2006 Animal Cloning Risk Assessment, Risk Management Plan and Guidance for Industry, the federal agency responsible for ensuring the safety of drugs, vaccines and other products stated:16

Because the risk assessment process has clearly shown that there are no food safety concerns for the meat and milk from cattle, swine, and goat clones and the progeny of all clones and that meat and milk from cattle, swine, and goat clones and the progeny of all clones are not materially different from their conventional counterparts, we do not believe, at this time, that there is a material fact that would be required to be included in the labeling of these foods based on the fact they are from clones or the progeny of clones.

Investigative journalist Martha Rosenberg wrote in January 2019 that, “Both Big Meat and Big Pharma welcome the trend of cloned and genetically engineered animals because they make more money. The Franken products are often presented as environmental advances.”

She observed that former FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb, MD was OK with Americans eating food derived from genetically engineered animals, including leftover lab animals used to produce the products. Rosenberg reported that Dr. Gottlieb touted the benefits of eating genetically engineered animals like the EnviroPig, which is reputed to excrete 75 percent less phosphorus and use 33 percent less land, thus reducing the carbon footprint. 17

Right now, eating animal meat and fish certified “organic” appears to be the only way to be reasonably sure it is not the product of cloning. In 2011, the USDA issued a National Organic Program Policy Memorandum on Cloning and Organic Livestock Production, stating that, “Cloning as a production method is incompatible with the Organic Foods Production Act (OFPA) and is prohibited under the National Organic Program (NOP) regulation” and “animals produced using cloning technology are incompatible with OFPA and cannot be considered organic under the NOP regulations.”   However, USDA added that, “Based on a recommendation of the National Organic Standards Board, USDA’s Agricultural Marketing Service is preparing the necessary public rule making to address the organic status of the progeny of animal clones.”18

Neurotoxic Smallpox Vaccine and Contamination of Vaccines

Vaccine products administered to both humans and animals have a long history of containing toxic ingredients and being contaminated with viruses, viral DNA and other adventitious agents that have known and unknown effects on human and animal health.19 The first human vaccine developed by Edward Jenner in 1796, was a human-animal hybrid live virus smallpox vaccine.20 21 The crude smallpox vaccine was notoriously dirty and neurotoxic, responsible for causing severe brain and immune system damage, including death.22 23 The extreme reactivity of smallpox vaccine given routinely to infants and children by doctors drew protests from parents, who watched their healthy children die or be left with brain damage, and was the origin of anti-vaccination movements in Europe and the U.S. in the 19th and early 20th centuries.24 25

There have been a number of cases where residual adventitious agents, which have known and unknown effects on human health, have been found to contaminate FDA licensed vaccines.26 27 These include identification of a cancer-causing monkey virus (SV40) in polio vaccines; bacteriophage in measles and polio vaccines; reverse transcriptase (RT) in measles and mumps vaccines, and porcine (pig) virus DNA sequences in rotavirus vaccines.28

Today, there are still technological limitations to adequate routine testing of human vaccine ingredients for contaminants.29 30 The U.S. Food and Drug Administration allows human vaccines licensed for use in the U.S. to contain residual DNA and proteins from dog kidney cells; army worm cells; yeast; and human lung tissue cells from a 14 week old aborted Caucasian male fetus, as well as mercury, aluminum, formaldehyde, 2-phenoxyethanol, Polysorbate 8031 and other potentially toxic ingredients.33 34

Are Vaccine Residues or Adjuvants in the Food?

The USDA’s Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) publishes a yearly residue report that screens food for the presence of veterinary drugs, pesticides and heavy metals in meat, poultry and processed egg products sold in the U.S. Samples are tested for aluminum, copper, strontium, lead, zinc, eight other heavy metals and also arsenic, and whether the residues have a soil, petrochemicals/fuel, fertilizer, sewage, coal burning or other origin.34 While heavy metal residues are generally found at lower levels than the residues of the many drugs given to food animals in the U.S., the veterinary literature also issues some warnings about the safety of eating the meat of vaccinated animals.

For example, researchers published a study in the Archives of Virology in 2011 advising that a “vaccine, particularly if injected subcutaneously, should be introduced into an area of the animal not used for human consumption such as behind the animal’s ear or in the area of the chest wall behind the elbow.” That way, wrote the researchers, “if there is any residual vaccine left or any reaction to it, there will be neither involvement of an edible part of the carcass nor trim losses in food animals.”35

Researchers writing in the journal ISRN Veterinary Science noted the success of  “inducing immunity through nonoral routes of administration,” and suggested using such nonorally administered vaccines in situations where “drug and vaccine residues are an important consideration for food safety.”36

Also, authors of a 2003 report on environmental pollution called “The Potential Impact of Technological Innovation on the Aquaculture Industry,” noted that, because some vaccines used in fish farming contain aluminium hydroxide, glucans, potassium aluminium sulphate or dimethyl sulphoxide, “where there is any possibility of vaccine residues remaining in the fish flesh, a suitable withdrawal period is established.”37

Vaccines Provide Lucrative Markets for Animal Pharma

In 2015, a marketing study estimated the global animal-vaccine market will be worth $7.2 billion by 2020, up from $5.5 billion in 2010. Industry officials report that, already, about one-third of the industry’s revenue is from vaccines.38

What is behind the vaccine boom?

In 2014, the World Health Organization declared that antibiotic resistance is a threat to global health.39 Growing antibiotic-resistance has rendered many antibiotics that are important to humans ineffective and government regulators and medical professionals often blame the practice of giving antibiotics to factory farm animals, although indiscriminate prescription of antibiotics by doctors to patients with viral, rather than bacterial, infections is clearly also responsible for antibiotic resistance.

Although many consumers no longer want to eat food containing antibiotics, the public is not aware of the use of vaccines in animals grown for food on factory farms. The popularity of using genetically modified organisms to create new vaccines presents new risks, especially with vaccines derived from spores. Here is a chilling quote from a 2018 article in Veterinary Research.40

Despite the progress being made with spore vaccines one key issue remains: the containment of GMOs. Because spores are dormant with the potential to survive indefinitely in the environment, the use of recombinant spores in spore vaccines is likely to raise environmental concerns and successful regulatory approvals may be slow or impossible to secure. For human use, it is likely that a case can be made that the recombinant spore vaccines addresses an unmet clinical need, but for animal use devising a method for biological containment will be crucial.

Animal and Human Vaccines Present Similar Questions and Risks

A quick look at veterinary vaccine literature reveals that the risks plaguing human vaccine production are similar to those of food animal vaccines. These include crippling side effects, unpredictable immune reactions, vaccines that may prevent disease but don’t prevent infection and transmission, vaccines that activate rather than contain a disease and even creation of new, deadlier pathogens.41 42

An example of all the things that can and do go wrong is found in a 2018 article, “Vaccines as Alternatives to Antibiotics for Food Producing Animals,”published in Veterinary Research.43

Potentially severe side-effects are a concern for many veterinary vaccines, in particular for attenuated-live vaccines and certain adjuvants, and can result in abortions, malformations and deaths…Even for vaccines with less dramatic side-effects, such as coccidia vaccines, productivity losses can be impactful and discourage routine use. Attenuated live vaccines can also carry a risk of reversion to virulent wild type strains, particularly when the molecular changes responsible for the attenuation of the vaccine strain have not been well-characterized.

Some live vaccines carry a risk of horizontal and/or vertical transmission and outbreaks caused by vaccine strains have been described…Finally, for some diseases prior vaccination can actually lead to an exacerbation of clinical symptoms after infection. The immunological reasons for this exacerbation are generally not well understood, but are thought to be due to a shift in immune response after vaccination.

Unfortunately, “not well understood” vaccine reactions do not dampen aggressive marketing by manufacturers of both animal and human vaccines.

Veterinary vaccine literature also acknowledges how, as with humans, the age of when an animal is vaccinated has a major effect on the vaccine’s outcome which can be very unpredictable, especially for very young animals with maternal antibodies and immature immune systems.44

Eliciting protective immune responses in young animals tends to be particularly challenging because the immune system is still developing, and because maternal antibodies can interfere with the development of protective immunity. Vaccination against diseases that require protective immunity in young animals can therefore be particularly challenging.

In addition, many veterinary vaccines effectively reduce the severity and economic impact of the disease, but do not fully prevent infection and shedding and therefore do little to reduce disease incidence…In some cases, vaccination can actually increase the survival time for infected animals and therefore enhance opportunities for disease transmission.

Emerging science is giving fair warning that, like with vaccines produced for human use, there are significant gaps in scientific knowledge about the known and unknown risks of veterinary vaccines, particularly those administered to animals eaten by humans.


References:

1 Market and Markets. Vaccines Market worth $66.45 billion by 2027, at a CAGR of 6.7%.
2 Fisher BL. WHO, Pharma, Gates and Government: Who Calls the Shots? NVIC Newsletter Jan. 27, 2019. 
3 Brandessence Market Research Co. Veterinary Vaccines Market 2019 Expected to Reach US $11.55 Billion by 2025 Growing at a CAGR of 6.80%. Sept. 17, 2019.
4 Mikulic M. Top 10 pharmaceutical companies based on global vaccine market share in 2017 and 2024. Statista Aug. 9, 2014.
5 Merck Animal Health. Poultry: Featured Products. 2019.
6 Merck Animal Health. Cattle: Featured Products. 2019
7 Merck Animal Health. Swine Product Guide. 2018.
8 Merck Animal Health. Aquaculture: Salmon. 2019.
9 Karreman HJ. Vaccination and Organic Cow Care. Eco Farming Daily.
10 Rosenberg M. The Big Get Bigger: Elanco’s Planned Acquisition of Bayer Animal Health Will Create Another Industry Giant. Organic Consumers Association Aug. 29, 2019.
11 Hoelzer K, Bielke L et al. Vaccines as alternatives to antibiotics for food producing animals. Part 2: new approach and potential solutions. Alternatives to Veterinary Research 2018; 49(70). 
12 Bellairs R, Osmond M. In: The Atlas of Chick Development (Third Edition) 2014
13 Davis K. Genetic Engineering and Cloning of Domestic Fowl. FDA Public Meeting on Cloning Issues Related to Animals Raised for Food Nov. 4, 2003.
14 U.S. Food and Drug Administration. A Primer on Cloning and Its Use in Livestock Operations. Aug. 29, 2018.
15 Hood M, Mollard P. The Dolly Legacy: As You Eating Cloned Meat? PhysOrg July 4, 2016. 
16 U.S. Food and Drug Administration. FDA’s Response to Public Comment on the Animal Cloning Risk Assessment, Risk Management Plan, and Guidance for Industry. Sept. 14, 2018.
17 Rosenberg M. Let them eat genetically engineered and cloned lab animals says US FDA Commissioner. Intrepid Report Jan. 14, 2019.
18
USDA. Policy memorandum on Cloning and Organic Livestock Production. Jan. 31, 2011. 
19
Murphy FA, Osburn BI. Adventitious Agents and Smallpox Vaccine in Strategic National Stockpile. Emerg Infect Dis 2005; 11(7): 1086-1089.
20 Collier LH. The Preservation of Vaccinia Virus. Bacteriol Rev 1954; 18(1): 74-86.
21 Huygelen C. Jenner’s cowpox vaccine in light of current vaccinology. Verh K Acad Geneeskd Belg 1996; 58(5): 479-536.
22 Lane JM, Ruben FL, Abrutyn E, Millar JD. Deaths Attributable to Smallpox Vaccination, 1959 to 1966, and 1968. JAMA 1970; 212(3): 441-444.
23 Fulginiti V, Papier A et al. Smallpox Vaccination: A Review Part III. Adverse Events. Clin Infect Dis 2003; 37(2): 251-271.
24 Wolfe RM, Sharp LK. Anti-vaccinationists past and present. BMJ 2002; 325(7361): 430-432.
25 Harvard University Library Open Collection Program. Vaccination. In: Contagion – Historical Views of Diseases and Epidemics. 2013.
26 Krause PR. Adventitious Agents and Vaccines. Emerg Infect Dis 2001; 7(Suppl 3): 562. 
27 Avanha H. Virus Safety of Biopharmacueticals: Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. Contract Pharma Nov. 14, 2011.
28 Petricciani J, Sheets R et al. Adventitious agents in viral vaccines: Lessons learned from 4 case studies. Biologicals 2014; 42(5): 223-236.
29 U.S. Food and Drug Administration. Guidance for Industry: Characterization and Qualification of Cell Substrates and other Biological Materials Used in the Production of Viral Vaccines for Infectious Disease Indications. Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research (CBER) February 2010. 
30 Gombold J., Karakasidis S et al. Systematic Evaluation of In Vitro and In Vivo Adventitious Virus Assays for the Detection of Viral Contamination of Cell Banks and Biological Products. Vaccine 2014; 32(24): 2916-2926. 
31 Parpia R. Polysorbate 80: A Risky Vaccine Ingredient. The Vaccine Reaction Feb. 6, 2017. 
32 McGovern C. Dirty Vaccines: New Study Reveals Prevalence of Contaminants. The Vaccine Reaction Feb. 6, 2017. 
33 CDC. Vaccine Excipient Summary: Excipients Included in U.S. Vaccines by Vaccine. January 2019. 
34 USDA. U.S. National Residue Program for Meat, Poultry and Egg Products. FY2017 Residue Sample Results.
35 Heegaard PMH, Dedieu L et al. Adjuvants and delivery systems in veterinary vaccinology: Current state and future developments. In: Archives of Virology 2011; 156(2): 183-202. 
36 Sadozai H, Saeidi D. Recent Developments in Liposome-Based Veterinary Therapeutics. ISRN Vet Sci 2013.
37 Bostock J, Telfer T et al. Report to the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution: The potential impact of technological innovation on the acquaculture industry. Aquaculture Research Reports 2003.
38 Rosenberg M. The Big Get Bigger: Elanco’s Planned Acquisition of Bayer Animal Health Will Create Another Industry Giant. Organic Consumers Association Aug. 29, 2019.  
39 World Health Organization. WHO’s first global report on antibiotic resistance reveals serious, worldwide threat to public health. Apr. 30, 2014.
40 Hoelzer K, Bielke L et al. Vaccines as alternatives to antibiotics for food producing animals. Part 2: new approach and potential solutions. Alternatives to Veterinary Research 2018; 49(70). 
41 Fisher BL. Pertussis Microbe Outsmarts the Vaccine As Experts Argue About Why. NVIC Newsletter Mar. 27, 2016. 
42 Fisher BL. The Science and Politics of Eradicating Measles. NVIC Newsletter May 25, 2019. 
43 Hoelzer K, Bielke L et al. Vaccines as alternatives to antibiotics for food producing animals: Part 1: Challenges and needs. Veterinary Research 2018; 49(64).
44 Ibid.

12 Responses

  1. This topic is very timely. For some time now, it just keep coming to my mind the domestic animals are constantly vaccinated, without any thought or discrimination, if that is slaughtered for human consumption.Now my suspicions are confirmed. Folks, this a lamenting matter. I was happened to grow up in rural environment and being as a child of a farmer vividly remembering when the vets came at least annually and vaccinated every living animals that we had. From chooks to cattles,horses, pigs and what ever domestic animals we had.With today’s understanding this is a worrisome thing to me, yet nobody is thinking or talking about.Thank you so much, Barbara to bring this issue too, to a wider audience.

  2. Oh and I must add this too, that when different animal plagues striked,in some seasons but mainly end winter-early spring, there was no protection that vaccines would provide. Not against the poultry cholera, foot and mouth disease to four legged animals, etc. All those infected animals were destroyed, for the farmers great loss, yet the vet’s services had to be fully paid regardless.This was in Europe BTW.

  3. As with human vaccines antibiotics are added to animal vaccines during their manufacture to prevent bacterial contamination, and although it is claimed that most of the antibiotics are removed during the vaccine purification process, trace quantities still remain. The reason given for the so-called removal of antibiotics in vaccines designed for humans is to prevent allergic reaction; that said, there appears to be little no concern for the likely stimulation of antibiotic resistance!!! As well, vaccines that are genetically engineered likely contain antibiotic resistant marker (ARM) genes for commonly used antibiotics in medicine…

    Consider for example the weakened genetically modified (recombinant vaccinia/rabies glycoprotein) live virus used in the V-RG oral rabies vaccine baits distributed across Canada and the United States; this particular strain of rabies was developed by “recombining it with the pox virus (vaccinia) and an antibiotic resistant biomarker for tetracycline”. The vaccine is then combined with “dog food or fishmeal and mixed with icing sugar, vegetable oil, artificial marshmallow flavor, dark-green food grade fat-soluble dye and a non-toxic bonding agent”.

    What are the implications of splicing two viruses together to make a vaccine and then linking them with an (ARM) antibiotic resistant marker for an antibiotic commonly used in medicine, and then releasing this hybrid into the environment?

    In an article entitled, “The Very Real Problem With Rabies Baits”, Dr Patricia Jordan States, “Dr. Terje Traavik PhD (Centre of Biosafety), has written extensively about how genetically engineered viruses are creating new hybrid viruses through recombination. He cautions that the characteristics of some of these new hybrid viruses are similar to both of the parent viruses but also include traits from neither. He notes that cases of rabies infected humans could be due to a return to virulence of the genetically engineered rabies virus with the pox viruses.”

    Dr. Jordan goes on to state, “In Arizona and other parts of the US, rabies is starting to jump species. For the first time, we are seeing rabies jump from bats to foxes to skunks with no bite required… It used to be that we could feel pretty safe about rabies because the chances that our dogs would trade saliva with another animal were pretty slim. Nowadays, thanks to recombinant vaccines, there is no bite required.”

  4. In the early 1990s I was a microbiologist for Merck and Co Inc. As part of my duties I toured pharmaceutical manufacturing plants, lab animal testing facilities and poultry and pig farms. My main territory was Ks-Ne-Ia-Mo, but I also consulted with animal farms and attended trade shows all over the US.

    One of the most surprising things I learned was how in the Midwest most lab-animal testing had absolutely nothing to do with saving human lives — but rather was about producing cheap meat/milk/eggs, by cramming animals together in horrific conditions. This necessitated giving them lots of vaccines and antibiotics in order to prevent massive die-offs from the stress and filth.

    The bread and butter of, “Animal Health Companies” was the development of new vaccines for food animals — trying to be first to market with something to counter each newly emerging pathogen, then scaring farmers into using it. Every batch was tested in even more animals to show that it triggered antibody titers and didn’t kill too many of them.

    Commercial chicken hatcheries are incredibly disturbing places — and these hatcheries are where ALL chickens come from — including, “cage free,” and “organic.” Even the chicks sold at feed stores for back-yard chicken raising come from these places and are highly vaccinated.

    Once I had connected the dots, and saw that my personal food choices were driving the most horrific and disturbing things I had ever seen in my whole life, I went vegan. It was the best decision I have ever made! I then had two healthy vegan pregnancies and my children (both grown now) tell me they are grateful that we made this decision on their behalf –before they were capable of understanding the bigger picture. They are also grateful that they have never intentionally contributed to harming any animals. They have also never been sick enough to require an antibiotic, nor to be hospitalized.

    It turns out that animal agriculture is the single biggest driver of virtually every category of environmental destruction now threatening the human future (World Watch Institute.) Small organic animal farms are not the answer — they actually require MORE land per pound of flesh produced, and produce more greenhouse gasses as well. With 7 billion humans on the planet, we simply don’t have enough land to supply the current meat demand with pasture-raised animals. The horrific destruction of the Amazon happening right now, is for GRASS-FED beef too.

    THE single biggest thing the average person can do, to create a livable future for our own children, and to reduce our risk of dying from the number one killer (heart disease) and support a more just world is to GO VEGAN — and it also will reduce your exposure to animal vaccines, AND everyone’s exposure to animal diseases (like bird flu, E coli 0157 etc)

    1. Joann I agree with your statements. I am grateful for this article and its’ information. I am aware that 99% of all people who become vegan were raised as eaters of animals, I was also raised that way. Then I learned the truth about how animals were treated, how calves were stolen away from cow moms, how cows are raped to be impregnated by human hands, how billions of male chicks and millions of male cows get killed as they cannot lay eggs or give milk, and saw horrific undercover video’s, I became vegan before 1990. Animals are treated to a prison holocaust today, incredibly inhumane and this article highlights even more reasons to eat as low on the food chain as possible. Animals contain far more concentrations of toxins and chemicals than fruits, vegetables, nuts seeds beans and grains do. Plant foods have no hormones in them and far fewer chemicals and toxins. Many people believe we are supposed to eat animals, yet all omnivore and carnivore animals can produce their own vitamin C. Herbivorous animals, like humans, cannot. Remember when you consume animals you digest their pain, suffering and negative emotions.The chemical soup these animals are injected with and fed is disgusting. Most people are aware that cattle and cows are ruminants and feed on grass/hay, yet are completely clueless that commercial cattle and cows (and chickens, turkeys, pigs…) are fed rendered animal proteins (body parts, feathers, hair, blood, bone) and rendered animal fat in their feed. Therefore they have a higher concentration of drugs, antibiotics/steroidal hormones/vaccines coming into their system than they already have. Whatever you consume please eat more and more plants, grow your own food if you can, and spare the animals. Animal agriculture is truly destroying this planet. Namaste;.

  5. “The U.S. Food and Drug Administration allows human vaccines licensed for use in the U.S. to contain residual DNA and proteins from dog kidney cells; army worm cells; yeast; and human lung tissue cells from a 14 week old aborted Caucasian male fetus, as well as mercury, aluminum, formaldehyde, 2-phenoxyethanol, Polysorbate 8031 and other potentially toxic ingredients.”

    As frightening as the above is there is another more frightening element the FDA is allowing in vaccines: Human Cancer Cells:

    FDA Meeting. Human Tumors for Vaccine Manufacture
    FOOD AND DRUG ADMINISTRATION
    Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research
    Meeting of
    The Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee (VRBPAC)
    September 19, 2012
    FDA White Oak Campus
    Building 31, Great Room
    Silver Spring, MD
    https://www.scribd.com/doc/246682536/FDA-Meeting-Human-Tumors-for-Vaccine-Manufacture

    The statements below are direct quotes from the meeting. Keep in mind that vaccines for humans as well as animals are not tested for carcinogens. This meeting was in 2012 so I would be willing to bet pharma & the government have already implemented this in vaccines for animals & humans because they have been looking for new vaccine growth mediums since the debacle with the African Green Rhesus Monkeys. The meeting transcript is 80 pages.

    *Doctors and the public may say “Oh, my God”!*
    “How is this group (of vaccines) going to be able to be accepted by the consumers … As soon as you hear “a tumor-derived cell line”, how do you explain that, put the public at ease?” (Dr.B)
    “… the practicing medical community and also the lay public. They are going to hear that we are recommending or that the manufacturers are making vaccines with tumorigenic cell lines and say, oh, my God, even if there’s no scientific basis to say, oh, my God.” (Dr.D)

    *Framing information to convince doctors and the public*
    “… because it’s a discussion of how one communicates these issues and how the public will perceive them. But I’m not completely sure that we have a complete answer on the fundamental scientific question. So how can you communicate a scientific consensus that the product is safe unless we’re sure that you, the experts we are asking to advise us are convinced that it’s safe?” (Dr.K)

    ******Plan to hide information and omit it from package inserts******
    “The minute you describe something in the package insert in terms of potential clinical safety concerns, I think that really precludes using these cell substrates.” (Dr. G)

    “When it gets right down to what’s in the vial and what the patient is going to ask me about, whether it’s safe, I’m not going to say, well, you know, HeLa cells kill nude mice.” (Dr. C)

    “I don’t know that our charge is to micromanage the package insert today. I think that’s a new discussion, with lots of issues that we haven’t really aired completely.” ( Dr.D)

    *Authorities uncertain about safety*
    “So I’m not sure that we can give a certainty – there’s no risk, don’t worry about this. – It’s sort of a brave new world. We’re all doing it together. But I think that you are doing a beautiful job.” (Dr. D)

    *Will learn about the risks as time goes by*
    “… even though there are challenges to using the new technologies, they have to be embraced and we have to continue to try to learn from them and struggle through that learning curve.” (Dr.M)

    Leader of the committee says “I’m a vaccine guy”, then suggests approval
    “I’m a vaccine guy. They are wonderful to prevent infectious diseases … I hope that I’m speaking for everybody when I say that’s the answer to your question. If not, please chime in now.” (Dr.D)

    ****The vaccines may cause tumors in recipients****
    “We have really identified three major factors that could potentially convey risk from tumor derived cells. And these include the cells themselves … and if they were tumor-derived cells then maybe they themselves could form tumors in a vaccine recipient.” (Dr. K)

    *A fact: tumor cell lines can cause tumors*
    “What I think is qualitatively different about the tumor cell lines is the fact that they can cause tumors.” (Dr.L)

    *Tumors may occur decades after vaccinations
    “But certainly, if you are going to address this question about tumor risk of vaccines made in tumor cell lines, it’s going to have to be a decade’s question.” (Dr.C)

    *FDA is there to help vaccine manufacturers*
    “… but we are here to consider the issues that we would like to advise the agency to consider in helping the company continue the manufacturing process, what should they be concerned about, what should they be watching for.” (Dr. D, leader of the meeting)

    *Doubt regarding test animals for assessing oncogenicity*
    “I’m not optimistic that we’re going to find animal models to assess oncogenicity of DNA. That’s why I’m feeling that maybe it’s the clearance aspect that we have to deal with, with respect to DNA.” (Dr.P)

    *Uncertainty about length of time for safety testing*
    “Are they watching these animals long enough? Should it be longer?” (Dr.D)
    “Is it relevant to safety that a cell forms a tumor after a year, a year and a half?” (Dr.P)

    *Poor testing for prions including mad cow disease*
    “There are a lot of things to be done in post-licensure. The field of the BSE (Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy, mad cow disease) is really, in terms of sensitivity, of detection, pretty poor” (Dr.C)

    The committee formally approves the method of making vaccines from human cancer tumors
    “To come back to the agency’s question of whether this Committee believes it’s correct scientifically to go forward with the development of these vaccines, our answer is yes.” (Dr.D)

    CONCLUSION:
    -Making vaccines with cells that are directly derived from human cancer tumors is faster and cheaper than breeding animals for the culture media.
    -Millions of potentially cancer-causing vaccines will be produced.
    -The vaccines may possibly cause genetic mutations.
    -Millions of dollars will be made by vaccine promoters.
    -The health of millions of consumers may be jeopardized.
    -Information about how these vaccines are made will be hidden from doctors and consumers.

  6. Clean, organic farming practices would obviate the need for “food animal vaccines” for most farmers/animal producers. Only the dirtiest, most inhumane producers “need” animal vaccines. Let’s do the most efficient, least harm method: clean, organic practices!

  7. This is a great, and horrifying article… I’ve spent the past 10 years researching the industrial food system and medical system and this is the first time I’ve read these details about animal vaccines and their effects…

    This is absolutely damning to the vaccine cult (and the factory farm supporters).

    I wonder if these facts about all the horrific problems caused by animal vaccines would get through the skulls of the ‘vaxxer’ cultists who rabidly believe in forced vaccination of humans?

  8. Thank you for this article. It is very timely as we have a farm with a small herd of cattle. I do not vaccinate my children or my pets. My husband and I have been contemplating the use of vaccines in our cattle. I have been against vaccinating them for all the concerns contained in this article. Our cows have plenty of space, high quality food, and great living conditions. I feel more confident now that by keeping them in a healthy, roomy environment they are not at risk for the nasty health issues that commercial cattle are exposed to.

    And sorry Joann, but there’s not chance we will EVER go vegan! We will continue to raise our own beef, chicken, and eggs for our family and our neighbors. We can raise/grow enough food on our land to feed at least 15 households and we don’t have a huge range. I appreciate you sharing your personal experience of working in the field of commercial farming and Merck, but you seem to have fallen for the scare tactic talking points that humans are destroying the world. Humans are meant to consume animals!

  9. I have to wonder if these animal vaccines are actually to the economic advantage of the farmers. If not, then hopefully farmers will figure this out and stop giving them.

    Though I suppose they do not have to worry about the long-term health of their livestock. As long as they can survive to the age where they will be slaughtered, and they can make it to market, it doesn’t much matter whether or not they are in good health.

  10. RedPill…may I copy your comment and post it on facebook? I can list your name (RedPill) or leave it anonymous. I think there is so much good info in your comment!! And I know a few people who support vaccines but believe in letting people choose for themselves whether they should get a vaccine or not. They would be horrified to learn this info. Esp since one of them now has stage 4 lung cancer. 🙁

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