We
already know that fur farming is grotesque and
brutal, often involving ripping the hides and
hairs off of screaming caged animals who are given no
other life. Now we also know that fur farming — more
specifically, farming mink — has contributed
significantly to the spread of COVID-19 and its multiple
variants. Many other animal species besides
humans can catch the deadly disease. But unlike other
non-human species, mink can then spread COVID... back to
humans. By the time they do, the virus has often mutated
considerably in their bodies. Mink-involved
COVID outbreaks have already occurred in the U.S.
multiple times.
There are more
than 200 mink farms operating in the U.S., locking up
these helpless furry animals and harvesting them for
their pelts. Even though researchers have discovered,
time and again, that mink are uniquely vulnerable to
COVID infections, the U.S. government has done very
little to monitor outbreaks or general animal health at
these farms. Even though cases
have exploded at upwards of 18 farms (that we know of so
far), the U.S. government has merely asked mink farmers
to please comply with voluntary
guidelines.
Mink farmers
have been quick to protect the secrecy at their farms,
refusing to support a more standardized system of
federal testing and reporting. Naturally, they're also
uninterested in working to protect these animals'
welfare and rights to kind treatment. What
happens at their farms affects these caged animals — and
all of us humans, too. But these fur-harvesting
profit-seekers don't seem to care. Mink fur
farmers exploit and harm animals. They rebuff federal
health investigations. And they allow COVID outbreaks to
run rampant, creating deadly new variants that
come back to infect the rest of us. Clearly the mink
farming industry cannot be trusted. Sign the petition to
demand the U.S. Congress shut down all fur farming in
the country,
now!
