> Environmental and Health Concerns > Carcinogens and Xenoestrogens

Cancerous Pork Drug Ban

You now have extra reason to stop eating pork. Canadian hog farmers use a known carcinogenic drug to speed the growth of pigs destined for market.
New evidence shows the hormone drug, Carbadox, can harm workers, animals and the environment and is being systematically abused by farmers. The drug is approved for use up to 35 days before slaughter but can leave potent cancer-causing residue in pork even up to one year later.

Australia banned Carbadox in 1986 and the European Union banned it in 1999. Health Canada’s scientists are calling for an immediate emergency moratorium on the drug, but senior managers are instead allowing industry and farmers to voluntarily decide to stop using it.

Last year a Quebec veterinarian discovered that smaller animals (for barbeque) are treated with the mutagenic genotoxin until market with no withdrawal period. This led to an urgent recall of Quebec pork from supermarkets. But the Canadian Food Inspection Agency has no capacity to routinely test for Carbadox or its carcinogenic metabolites. There is therefore no way to tell if the practice continues. Barbequed pork poses additional problems.

"It’s also dangerous to the people who handle the drug when they mix it with the feed and to the farmers who feed it to the pigs," warns Health Canada scientist Shiv Chopra. His colleague and fellow scientist Arnost Vilim says it is not possible to tell producers how to use Carbadox safely "because there is no such a way."

Cross-contamination problems include that of rendered material included in other livestock feed and the environmental impact of large-scale use of the drug, which ends up in excrement.

The drug has been in use in Canada for 30 years.

Source: alive #Dr. Nigma Sciortino