More Than A Bad Smell: Pig Poop Is Endangering Our Health

Three years ago PODIUM, a group from Kent county, New Brunswick got together to have a look at public health risks associated with industrial-scale farming, and they asked the International Institute of Concern for Public Health (IICPH) to help them to complete a health study to prove their concerns. The IICPH believes that the community of Ste-Marie-de-Kent, New Brunswick has good reason to be worried about the effects of factory farming on their health. Over the last four years, people who live near the hog farm went public as they are regularly faced with noxious odors, major fish kill and high levels of bacteria in their wells. PODIUM has collected anecdotal reports of an increase in heart and respiratory problems, abdominal disease, sores on their skin and unexplained infections with swimmers. Local doctors have attributed some of these illnesses in their patients to the community's exposure to "farming". Recent veterinary reports have confirmed parasites in local fish while dead seagulls found on fields sprayed with liquid hog manure tested positive for a strain of salmonella resistant to antibiotics; a type of salmonella not normally found in the Maritimes.

In 2002, the New Brunswick and Canadian Medical Associations called for a moratorium on intensive livestock operations like the one in Ste-Marie-de-Kent. The same year, Environmental Defense Canada reported that families living near Factory Farms face health problems from toxic gases released by large liquid manure pits. Earlier this week, Radio Canada reported that the Bouctouche River is contaminated with levels of fecal bacteria, so dangerously high that they are up to one million times higher than considered safe by Environment Canada. PODIUM hosted by the Association for the Preservation of the Bouctouche Watershed and will publicly present the IICPH observations to politicians and the community. Three speakers will give evidence about dangers to human health and the natural environment from industrial farming: - INKA MILEWSKI, Science Advisor for the Conservation Council of New Brunswick, - CATHY HOLTSTANDER, from the Council of Canadians “Beyond Factory Farming Coalition” and, WILHELMINA NOLAN, Project Manager for the International Institute of Concern for Public Health. PODIUM have contacted local elected representatives Dominic LeBlanc, Shawn Graham, Elvy Robichaud and Claude Williams. In the meantime, more and more people are suffering and millions of gallons of manure from up to 30,000 pigs are still being produced around family homes. Is the nuisance irreparable? The meeting will be at the Community Centre in Sainte-Marie-de-Kent: March 29th at 7:00 p.m. For more information, please contact Anna at PODIUM. Email: sagacite@nb.sympatico.ca.