Dr. Mercola
Waking Times
The first large-scale animal factories appeared in the early 1970s, and while these initial confined animal feeding operations (CAFOs) were for egg laying hens, pork and beef producers soon followed suit.
Today, most meat sold in the US (beef, pork, chicken, turkey, etc.) is raised in a CAFO.
It’s a corporate-controlled system characterized by large-scale, centralized, low profit-margin production, processing, and distribution systems, built around efficiency — producing more for less.
By 1980, chicken, pig, beef, and dairy CAFOs were firmly established, and over the following decade, processed fast food became the norm, courtesy of abundant inexpensive meats.
We are now experiencing the consequences of manufacturing animals on factory farms rather than raising them properly. Antibiotic-resistant disease is one serious consequence that now claims the lives of about 23,000 Americans every year.
