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Dear friend,
In the Texas panhandle, just a few months ago, there was a calamity involving animals that got just a passing mention in the national news. A fire, triggered by an electrical problem, raced through a factory farm with thousands of cows inside who had been put to work in a massive industrial milk production enterprise.
There were 18,000 cows at the complex.
They were trapped as fire overtook the buildings. The animals had nowhere to go. There was no one to help them escape.
Many were eaten up by the hot, fast-moving flames. Smoke choked and killed the others.
No one—from the owners of the dairy conglomerate to anyone else with a conscience—could think that this was anything but a colossal tragedy.
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It was a vivid example of the sacrifice that cows make to put milk into the marketplace for human consumption.
Too often we forget about the sacrifices that animals make in agriculture.
The farm in north Texas was no Old McDonald’s Farm. These cows were in confinement. Each was selectively bred for high yields of milk, with each one built to produce as much as 25,000 pounds in a single year. The massive output means that the cows are “spent” at just 3 to 5 years of age and then made into a low-grade beef product.
A Milk Mandate in Our Public Schools
Each year, the USDA spends $1 billion to reimburse school districts for cow’s milk for the National School Lunch Program—a familiar program for those of us who attended public schools. For eight decades, the federal government has required milk on every tray, and it provides no nutritionally equivalent option to cow’s milk for the kids getting nutrition assistance.
Yet now we know that lactose intolerance is widespread in our society, and millions of kids avoid a food staple that makes them sick.
Up to 75 percent of African Americans, 65 percent of Latinos, and 90 percent of Asian Americans and Native American are lactose intolerant—causing diarrhea, nausea, cramps, bloating, and in severe cases, vomiting. The National Institutes of Health reports [[link removed]] the majority of all people have a reduced ability to digest lactose after infancy, and lactose intolerance “is also very common in people of West African, Arab, Jewish, Greek, and Italian descent.” Even 15 percent of people of European descent are lactose intolerant.
Of the 30 million kids getting milk, nearly 10 million kids throw the milk away in unopened cartons. Add in the kids who sip and then toss the rest, and you can understand how one separate study noted that school kids are dumping 45 million gallons of milk each year down the drain.
All that sacrifice and labor from the cows, and massive volumes of their milk are tossed in the trash.
Call it the government’s “milk mandate.” A squandering of Americans' hard-earned tax dollars. And a disturbing lack of understanding and appreciation of what cows endure to put milk in the carton.
Giving Kids a Choice, Giving Cows a Break
In September, U.S. Senators John Fetterman, D-Penn., John Kennedy, R-La., Cory Booker, D-N.J., and Roger Wicker, R-Miss., introduced legislation (S. 2943) to provide a simple, common-sense fix: give kids a nutritionally equivalent, plant-based option. U.S. Representatives Troy Carter, D-La., and Nancy Mace, R-S.C., have the companion bill (H.R. 1619) in the U.S. House.
Their bills, the Addressing Digestive Distress in Stomachs of Our Youth (ADD SOY) Act, require public schools to offer a nutritionally equivalent plant-based milk option to kids participating in the National School Lunch Program and directs the USDA to reimburse schools for the cost of the soy milk provided.
“The majority of children of color are lactose intolerant, and yet our school lunch program makes it difficult to access nutritious, non-dairy beverages,” said Sen. Booker, one of the quartet of bipartisan leaders of the bill. “We must ensure that all children have access to nutrient-rich drink options that do not make them sick.”
“We need to be doing whatever it takes to make sure our kids are fed, including eliminating red tape in our nutrition-assistance programs to expand students’ access to more options. It is totally unacceptable that there are 30 million food insecure children in our country while a lack of milk alternatives creates $300 million of food waste a year,” said Senator Fetterman.
“This bipartisan bill will create more equitable nutrition options to keep our kids happy and healthy. Too many children who cannot safely or comfortably consume dairy are being forced to accept containers of cows’ milk on their lunch trays,” said Rep. Carter.
“The federal government is wasting $300 million of our tax dollars a year by mandating that every school kid getting nutrition assistance has a carton of cow’s milk on the tray even though millions of them don’t want it and get sick from it,” said Rep. Mace.
This is a government program on autopilot since World War II, and it makes no sense for school kids, taxpayers, or the cows. The government is overreaching by subsidizing and promoting milk beyond its natural appeal to consumers. Kids need a choice in the classroom.
Please, take action today and urge your lawmakers to end the "dairy milk mandate" in the National School Lunch Program! A Senate bill is soon to come, so it’s important to urge your two U.S. Senators to support this reform too. [[link removed]]
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Remember, all animals matter, including those raised for food. Let’s never forget about the animals at the front end of our supply chains.
For smarter government, better outcomes for animals,
Wayne Pacelle [[link removed]] Wayne Pacelle
President
Center for a Humane Economy
Photo courtesy of Andrew Skowron/We Animals Media.
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