ANIMAL DRUGS, GMO LABELS, FOOD WASTE ACTIONS

Tweet | Pinterest   Subscribe & Read Past Issues | OCA Homepage | Donate | View on Web BLOG POST OF THE WEEK ENOUGH Already We’ve all grown accustomed to the steady parade of television ads—$3 billion year worth, by some estimates—urging us to “ask our doctors” about the latest miracle drug. Pharmaceutical ads have been commonplace since the 1990s, after the U.S. Food & Drug Administration (FDA)cleared the way for prescription drug companies to aggressively market their wares directly to consumers. Wisdom and ethics aside, it’s easy to see why Big Pharma would push pills to humans, to treat human ailments. It’s big money. But a drug company that makes animal drugs, purchased not by consumers but by factory farms, advertising direct to consumers who will never actually purchase those drugs? How does that make sense? If you’re Elanco, the $2.3-billion animal drug division of Eli Lilly, you make it seem sensible by spinning the message. In Elanco’s case, the message is this: Without our animal drugs, the world will starve. It’s a message that paints the drug maker as an altruistic savior, instead of the profit-motivated animal abuser and public health threat it actually is. Read the blog post ACTION ALERT Invitation Only As the calendar flips over to 2016, the Grocery Manufacturers Association, Monsanto and the rest of the GMO junk food industry are growing ever more desperate to prevent Vermont’s GMO labeling law (Act 120) from taking effect onJuly 1, 2016. Their next move? A closed-door, invitation only meeting with U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Secretary Tom Vilsack and GMO labeling advocates in the hope of striking a compromise, one that would no doubt preempt Vermont’s law. Should the GMO labeling movement, which has fought so long and so hard to require food manufacturers to disclose this basic information about their products, settle for anything less than a mandatory labeling law like Vermont’s? We don’t think so. Vermont’s GMO labeling law must be allowed to take effect July 1, 2016, as scheduled. Then we can talk about potential next steps, including federal regulations or legislation. We don’t yet know the date of this upcoming meeting, other than that Vilsack has publicly said it would happen in January. OCA hasn't received an invitation. But we do know this: Vilsack needs to hear from you, from all of us, now! URGENT! TAKE ACTION: Tell USDA Sec. Tom Vilsack to back off and let Vermont’s GMO Labeling Law take effect! Text "Back off" to 97779 to join OCA's mobile network and take action! ACTION ALERT Waste Not People go to bed hungry every night in nearly 7 million households in the U.S., according to a report published last month by the National Commission on Hunger. And yet, Americans throw away 40 percent of our food—the equivalent of $165 billion each year—according to the National Resources Defense Council. It doesn’t make sense. That’s why U.S. Rep. Chellie Pingree, (D-Maine) has introduced H.R. 4184, the Food Recovery Act—a bill to address food waste. H.R. 4148 proposes comprehensive legislation to address food waste in four areas: at the consumer level; at the retail (grocery stores and restaurants) level; at the institutional (schools, hospitals and other institutions); and on the farm. For consumers, that means better information about expiration dates. For the hungry, it means redistributing perfectly good food to those who need it. For farmers, it means tax incentives to waste less. For the environment, it means less planet-warming methane spewed into the atmosphere. Heck, this bill could even help protect endangered species. What’s not to love? TAKE ACTION! Tell Congress to support H.R. 4184 the Food Recovery Act!