You probably won’t get swine flu from eating pork, but you will help spread the disease and increase the chances of another epidemic.
Swine Flu from Eating Pork
The World Health Organization has stated that the H1N1, or swine flu, virus can occur in meat if the animal was diseased at the time of slaughter. However, since pork is usually cooked before being eaten, the heat from cooking will likely kill the virus and the consumer will not become infected with the disease.
While eating pork may not give you swine flu, you will support an industry that spreads the disease.
Origins of Swine Flu
While some are pointing fingers at a large hog farm in Perote, Veracruz State, Mexico, and local residents have been blaming their health problems on the farm for years, the origins of the H1N1 strain in the 2009 swine flu epidemic have not be scientifically determined. The WHO prefers the term “H1N1” over “swine flu” because the virus had not previously been found in pigs, but the H1N1 virus has now been found in a herd of pigs in Alberta, Canada.
The H1N1 strain includes a genetic mix of human, swine and avian influenza, and Phase 1 of influenza outbreaks always begins in non-human animals. Influenza viruses in pigs mutate rapidly, and according to The New Scientist:
One in five US pig producers actually makes their own vaccines, says (Amy Vincent of the US Department of Agriculture), as the vaccine industry cannot keep up with the changes. This rapid evolution posed the "potential for pandemic influenza emergence in North America", Vincent said last year. (Richard Webby of St Jude's Children's Research Hospital), too, warned in 2004 that pigs in the US are "an increasingly important reservoir of viruses with human pandemic potential." One in five US pig workers has been found to have antibodies to swine flu, showing they have been infected, but most people have no immunity to these viruses.
The Spread of Swine Flu
Keeping animals, including humans, in close quarters contributes to the spread of swine flu and other diseases. In the 1976 swine flu outbreak at Fort Dix in New Jersey that killed one soldier and infected up to 230 people, it is believed that the outbreak was “a zoonotic anomaly caused by introduction of an animal virus into a stressed population in close contact in crowded facilities during a cold winter.” It seems the flu spread among the new recruits but no further, partially because “contact between basic trainees and others was limited.”
One of the arguments against factory farming is the rapid spread of disease among the animals because the animals are kept in such close quarters. As explained above, the animal agriculture industry has difficulty keeping up with rapidly mutating viruses, and as of this writing in May, 2009, there is currently no vaccine for the H1N1 virus.
Supporting animal agriculture, and especially factory farming, contributes to the spread of swine flu and other diseases because the animals are kept in close quarters with each other and have regular contact with human farm workers who can then spread the disease to other humans.
