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Sunday, June 14, 2015

Gettysburg, Pa. factory-farm eggs: "A serious food safety risk" By Ray Wallace

North of Gettysburg, Pa., that's Hillandale Farms
on the left and two other factory chicken farms in the immediate area. 
 Hillandale eggs are sold by Costco 
under the brand name "Nearby Eggs"
in cartons showing chickens on grass:
 Their lifetime reality:




The International New York Times:

     An undercover investigation by the Humane Society of the United States found unsanitary and “inhumane” conditions at a Gettysburg, Pa., farm that supplies eggs to Costco, the animal welfare group said on Tuesday. Video collected at the farm, operated by Hillandale Farms, in April and May by someone “associated with” the Humane Society showed hens laying eggs in cramped cages with deceased birds. Broken eggs and dead chickens were on the floor. Hillandale provides eggs to some Costco stores under the brand name Nearby Eggs. The Humane Society called on Costco to provide a timeline for its promised transition to cage-free eggs. Costco, the third-largest retailer in the United States, did not have an immediate comment. Hillandale Farms said it was aware of the investigation, but did not comment further.

     -- From “Inhumane’ Conditions Found at Egg Supplier for Costco,” by Reuters, at this June 9, 2015 International New York Times site:
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/10/business/inhumane-conditions-found-at-egg-supplier-for-costco.html
A version of this brief appears in print on June 10, 2015, on page B2 of the New York edition with the headline: ‘Inhumane’ Conditions Found at Egg Supplier for Costco. 



The Humane Society:

     Newly-released undercover footage shows inhumane treatment of animals and food safety concerns at a facility supplying eggs to Costco, the nation’s second-largest grocery retailer. The Humane Society of the United States shot the video during an undercover exposé.

The investigation was conducted recently at Hillandale Farms in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. It uncovered:

Birds forced to share their cages with dead, decaying and even mummified corpses—living 24 hours a day, eating and laying eggs for human consumption on top of their dead cage-mates.

Hens languishing in cages, packed so tightly they can’t even fully extend their wings, some with their legs stuck in the cage wire. Each hen is given only about 67 square inches of space — less space than an iPad — on which to spend her entire life.

Piles of broken, rotting, fly-covered eggs, along with dead birds, on the facility’s floors....

     In Iowa, Hillandale’s operations were responsible for the largest egg recall in U.S. history in 2010 after a devastating Salmonella outbreak. The new investigation comes at a time when three states have declared emergencies due to bird flu, which is exacerbated by unsanitary, overcrowded conditions on poultry operations.

     -- From “Undercover Exposé: Inhumane Treatment of Animals, Food Safety Concerns at Costco Egg Supplier,” at this June 9, 2015 Humane Society site:
http://www.humanesociety.org/news/press_releases/2015/06/inhumane-treatment-costco-egg-supplier-060915.html



"A serious food safety risk":
The quote is from a three-minute video titled “Costco Doesn’t Want You To Know What's Wrong With These Eggs,” at this current YouTube site:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZeabWClSZfI

24 comments:

Anonymous said...

You don't have to go to Costco to get Hillandale eggs. They're sold under the Hillandale label in some of our local grocery stores.

Anonymous said...

Who cares. They're chickens for god sake!!

Anonymous said...

Factory farmed food is what is killing people. It's not the food itself but the conditions and over processing that is giving people cancers and other diseases never heard of before.
When you start changing the composition of what is supposed to sustain the human body it is never good and results in poor health.

Anonymous said...

makes me want to eat more of them. Go away, hippy.

Anonymous said...

inhumane is subjective. Inhumane is watching overfilled grocery carts of overweight people with overweight children tagging along on assistance buying Junkfood and high sodium everything.. a good breakfast of Bacon and eggs and cereal would stop the cravings for designer ice cream and 6$ a dozen stale glazed doughnuts

Anonymous said...

Is COSTCO union? I bet if they were Union this would not be aimed at them.

Anonymous said...

Makes me sick to think these animals are
kept in such filthy , inhumane conditions
plus the factspread of disease is rampid !

GREED is what it "all boils down to!"
It's All About THe Money!!!

Disgusting!

Anonymous said...

I have read they were set up by the employee who was supposed to clean up this mess. He staged it then took pictures

Anonymous said...

Only buy cage free. They are still factory farmed and the chickens are packed in tight but they are at least able to turn around and move more freely.
To those of you who think only hippies support better treatment of livestock I say this: Healthier animals make healthier better tasting food, and for less than a dollar more a dozen I get piece of mind knowing that an animal didn't live a lifetime of torture. Not only that the cage free allows for a better process of composting the manure, which for our area means less damage to the bay and millions more in income from our seafood industry.

Anonymous said...

11:31am your an IDIOT!!!

Anonymous said...

Honestly, the chickens don't know there's a better way to live.
I buy from a little farm that lets the birds run around.

Anonymous said...

Kind of looks like one of Purdue's farms that I used to catch chickens at.

Anonymous said...

Because Union workers are in a better position to negotiate for healthier working conditions, and that includes being exposed to rotting dead animals in disgusting conditions.

Anonymous said...

I stopped reading at HSUS. Such a fraud organization who should be stripped of their non-profit and criminally charged. Worse than PETA, and that's saying something.

Anonymous said...

Do they tell you their thoughts and feelings at this farm too?

Anonymous said...

Anonymous Anonymous said...
Do they tell you their thoughts and feelings at this farm too?

June 12, 2015 at 2:34 PM

Yes, they squawk to me all the egging time

Anonymous said...

2:23 spot on there is already a shortage of eggs.

NIH reproducing Avian Flu viruses under orders by Obama then we see the Avian Flu used as the means for more Marxist scarcity in our food supply.

They want to regulate supply of all Foods like Lenin did then we get this trash activism and the same bleeding hearts who cry about the impact on the poor for just about anything

When they buy all of the Food they want every month and are allowed jump our borders like a Pool fence and to buy garbage because they should not be told how to spend our tax dollars

Steve said...

Folks, this article is by Ray Wallace! He only presents one side; his side! He'll collect all the "evidence"he can to "make" a story. He's a pathetic liar that makes his own agenda. He hates certain companies like Perdue, and has a penchant over pollution around the Susquehanna. You can bet that these photos were set up, and any "claims" he has are cherry picked from a completely more reasonable document.

And the broken eggs photo? Don't you think at an egg laying facility, thousands of broken eggs are culled each day? Or,would you rather have them packaged in your dozen crates and put on the shelves?

Ray needs help. His hatreds cause him to write articles against perfectly normal businesses that compete with other perfectly normal businesses that use the same practices. His only agenda is to pick on Perdue, and now, in this case, Costo.

Poor Ray. Pray for him. Maybe someday he will find a career...

Anonymous said...

Are there people who eat raw eggs? I cook the heck out of them making them safe to eat.That's how I feel about food recalls.Practically anything is safe when it's cooked thoroughly.If someone orders a rare hamburger,and if the establishment complies then oh well.

Anonymous said...

Don't believe everything you read.
Do your own research.

Anonymous said...

It's true---animalsi: cattle, hogs,chickens are kept in tight inhumane living conditions--Why? More profit for
owners. It's All About The Money.
It's past disgusting!!!
Buy from local farmers when u can.


Anonymous said...

Research will get you the same
thing you're seeing here. We
the people should demand better
living conditions for the animals &
for our safety also.
1:12 pm----you are so right!!

Anonymous said...

I love reading comments from some of you flaming hypocrites, probably stuffed your pie holes this am with a double helping of scrambled eggs and bacon.

No thought whatsoever given to what it actually takes to feed millions of people with those eggs every single day.

do you fools think eggs just magically show up at the grocery store?

yes, there may be a few chickens in a house of 60,000 that may have died and were yet to be removed. That stuff happens because the logistics to feed your sorry arses is a lot more involved than just wandering through an egg laying operation and grabbing dead birds out of the cage.

Ah, but then, you people don't have to worry about such things. You're more worried about why a carton of eggs has gone up thirty cents in price.

Clueless doesn't even come close to describing some of you.

Here's a tip, start your own backyard flock and produce your own "organic" food and stay the heck away from the grocery store's "factory" food.

Oh, that's right, you don't know what the heck to do. You have no more of an idea what kind of feed laying birds need than I do building a rocket.

Course, I don't make comments on blogs about rocket construction either, because I know I don't know squat about rocket science.

Maybe you Ray Wallace supporters could start your own healthy, white-gloved animal growing operation where all animals are treated with the utmost respect, right before you kill them and eat them. I bet those animals will be so grateful to you.

I hope if and when the SHTF, you pathetic tree huggers find enough organic food to survive.

Anonymous said...

3:39
You specifically need to do the research