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Subscribe to RSSSHANGHAI - Over 2,200 pigs have been found dead in one of Shanghai's main water sources, official media reported on Monday, triggering a public outcry in China where concerns over food safety and environmental pollution run high.
The carcasses were probably dumped in the Huangpu river in Zhejiang province and the total number was expected to increase, the Global Times quoted Xu Rong, director of Shanghai Songjiang District Environmental Protection Bureau, as saying.
"We have to act quickly to remove them all for fear of causing water pollution," she was quoted as saying as the national parliament, where pollution has been a hot topic, met in Beijing.
Officials were investigating, media said.
An official at the Songjiang environment bureau declined to comment when contacted by Reuters.
The Shanghai government said in a statement posted on its website on Monday that workers were continuing to collect carcasses from the river and it was closely monitoring the water quality although no pollution has been found so far.
Water contamination, caused by fertilizer run-off, chemical spills and untreated sewage, is a major concern in China. The government is planning to invest $850 billion over the next decade to improve the water supply system.
The discovery of the dead pigs over the weekend quickly made the rounds in social media, with many bloggers criticizing the authorities for their delayed response.
"Related government departments should seriously investigate this and get to the bottom of it," said one blogger by the name of Ting Tao. "The government should really pay attention to people's lives and take no time to solve food safety issues."
Copyright 2013 Thomson Reuters. Click for restrictions.
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legion
Needs a couple of truck roads of fried rice.
I can't help but wonder why, in these blogs, it seems that the first person to post NEVER has anything to say and ALWAYS comes across as an idiot. Why is that? Am I missing something?
Apparently not.
is one of those pigs that came from the north, the N korean leader....just wondering
Nice Biblical reference, teapartysnuffer!
Apparently the writer didn't think it was important to mention WHY the dead pigs were dumped in the river.
Apparently this is not The Year of The Pig.
Maybe they were genetically altered Frankenstein pigs that couldn't survive on a diet of rice.
This is disgusting...China treats their animals and people like absolute garbage.
Oink..so sad...I mourn my colleagues.
Ya think?
That's a lot of dead pigs in a river. I'm pretty sure there's a logical explanation.
Dead pigs in China is worthy of MSNBC coverage? What's next? When a chinese farts?
Americans are more stupid than ever.
It is a big issue to enlighten people about food safety as well as animal cruelty issues. Further, it is news worthy because China breeds/sells/eats more pigs/pork than any other country! If there is a food safety issue, that could affect you, because many Asian restaurants in the US and Europe imports the majority of their food from China including the pork they use in many of their dishes! Moreover, if the whole world knows about their nasty food practices, hygiene and the conditions in which they hold animals for human consumption, maybe the government will make a change for the good of all concerned.
How dare MSNBC feature news from outside the bubble that you live in, right? A couple thousand pigs in a river...is not news! This happens all the time! (sarc)
Maybe Americans are more stupid than ever because they live in a bubble where they aren't exposed to much more than the smell of their own farts.
Maybe We Americans need to get our heads out of our azz and look around, if this is not NEWS worthy what do you think is Republicans playing games that will destroy our COUNTRY?
Thank you, Emanuel. I wasn't going to respond to the dummy. Kinda glad someone did. But we all know the saying: You can't fix stupid. So, probably a waste of time.
I'm an American living and working in China. I go to Shanghai on a regular basis and this is especially news for someone like me. Granted, I don't need MSNBC for this, I can get it from the local news where I live or the newspaper.
Mentioned was that the Huangpu was the major source of drinking water for Shanghai. Truth is, though, that if a person can afford it bottled water is the only way to go. Pesticides aside, the water may have heavy metals as well.
Not as bad as Beijing, however.
But the dead pig thing is an issue extending well beyond China. As 1forall wrote, a lot of pork is exported to the US and Europe (Australia as well).
We'll see how this runs out. Believe it or not the government WILL make a concentrated effort to find the cause.
Sam - I know right? Like, lets get rid of the EPA.
Sam, are you 12? I could see a 12 yr old being that ignorant and irrational, but not an adult.
I love how you blame one party...it shows you clearly have been in a coma or just plain stupid, bud...Which is it?
I offer you a solution, giving your the benefit of the doubt on Ignorant vs. stupid...Go read how our Gov't is supposed to work. THEN read WHO controlled "what" during the different Presidents we have had...THen research more and comprehend WHO DID what...
BUT...IF you choose to blame Republicans alone...You know...Blame Bush for WAR and Republicans today for mess, then you are a STUPID IDIOT. Your choice...
Emanuel,
Good response man.... LOL...
Creek Dog, stop being such a butt sniffer.
The Bangkok Post TV station ran a report on this with pictures. Many of the swine still had their ear tags, locating the owners will be very easy...
This is a major problem due to many of these Chinese cities use the river water as their only drinking water source...
Live pig prices in China have fallen 53.55 percent to $1.75, per kg in just one year as cheaper pork imported from Thailand has forced local companies to drop prices to compete. Current whole hog prices are $2.15, per kg in Thailand and expected to go LOWER , now that Chinese New Year celebrations are over...
Plus Thailand & Hong Kong, have banned birds/eggs transported from Laos or Cambodia, due to a H5N1 deaths. So there could also, be a disease connection...
How do you connect pork prices with Spring Festival (the week following New Year's day)? I live in China and I missed this one.
I can see fireworks and firecracker prices going down...
Pork is an animal once a toxin enters most of it stores in the meat. There are guidelines for clean food in leviticus 11 or 19 not sure number. I stopped eating pork when I found that it didnt change with new testament thats just how the new version bibles probably changed by unbelievers scribes is taught. My point is China has sprayed herbicides on our garlic thats unsafe. they are taking our fresh water by the tanker fulls from the lakes in north america. In return we get plastic bottles made by china with lithium traces in the plastic. I am certain if we dont get rid of this circle of doom thats in the white house and congress all this nasty crap will be filtered into our food here like the dregs from cubas prisons in 1980 into te people population. And we all know what that did to miami . I wish we could get rid of Clintons especially he and big daddy bush started this. Our president is whining about our food and obesity but our tunain USA has 50 % more allowed mercury than canada or united kingdom
jetjoky,
I'm assuming you missed your traditional - The New Year's Eve/reunion dinner, they are usually very large and includes dishes of meat (pork and chicken) and fish...
Thai commerce minister Kittirat Na Ranong said, "The pork price should decline once the Chinese New Year festival ends as people would no longer have to purchase pork for this occasion."
China has little choice but to import more pork through the winter. Officials will want to keep prices lower and prevent domestic discord over food-price shocks. They also don't want to ruin the banquets and good cheer of the population when it rings in the Chinese New Year...
Even my Thai family, who never miss a chance to celebrate, had BBQ pig and other special pork meals, this year...
Offhand I'd say somebody had a bunch of dead pigs they wanted to get rid of.
Dead pigs? Beware of any Chinese meat exports!!! [recycled dead pig]... Thank God I'm a vegetarian...
The pigs probably died from drinking the water!
...My first thought would be testing to see if the pigs died of disease... Something like this happened in Malaysia decades ago and farmers took quick way to get rid of sick pigs hoping to save the rest... Turned out most of the rest also sick... farmers in contact with pigs died... cats and dogs in contact with pigs died... Mercy of mercies... never mutated to where you could get except from pigs...
...Farmers also ran a lot of their pigs over the border... afraid that the authorities would kill their pigs... Often the authorities had to... soldiers with flamethrowers... Government tried to stop smuggling by offering fair market price for pigs killed, but many farmers ignorant...
...If the disease had mutated to where contacts human to human or other animals to human became possible, we all would have been in serious trouble... extremely high death rate.
...Scientists best guess: Malaysia doesn't have a lot of good farm land... so one way to make the jungle pay is to cut it back and set up giant pig farms... (obviously not run by the Moslem population)... But as you get deeper into the back country, some "nasty" that has been around forever suddenly makes an appearance... in this case they figure that an infected bad died and fell into the pig farm and was consumed... Soon pigs were staggering, falling, and dying in great numbers...
ALWAYS CHECK WHERE YOUR DOG FOOD IS MANUFACTURED.....most is made in China, even with nice healthy, American sounding names...thousands of American pets have died or become ill from that stuff. Wouldn't surprise me if those pigs ears chews came from pigs like these.
I wouldn't want to be the person responsible for the dumped pigs when the Chinese authorities find them..........but on the other hand I say whatever happens to these polluters "should" happen to the polluters of the environment here in the States. We'd have to say bye bye to the Koch brothers, Bp's board of directors, the whole Bush family and many many others too big to fail too big to fine too big for their britches. ROFL! Sic em China let's see what your punishment is for these sick corporate individuals.
They must not have been good enough to make drywall out of.
Where do you think they are going after they are removed from the river???
My guess would be fertilizer and feed/food additive...
Ever hear of 'Mad Cow', Scrapie, and other Prion diseases???
You'd be guessing wrong, AC. They will be destroyed. Likely burned.
Unscrupulous farmers who dump dead pigs in public places can be fined up to 3,000 yuan ($483).
The official disposal points around Jiaxing are already full, so far they have recovered 5,916 dead pigs.
The disposal center stores the dead pigs in five pools, allowing them to decompose. "There are around 5,000 dead pigs in the pools that will be full in a month, which means we will not be able to handle anymore," Qiu said... see .globaltimes.cn/content/767720.shtml
-"that results of hourly water tests were normal."
Prove it.
First af all people you are forgetting the point that this is animal cruelty (and guess what, we are animals too in case you forgot)
Secondly, the point that these poor animals must have been only a couple of days old and never have seen the green of the fields or the warmth of the sun, because to humans they are worthless and yet they have the capability to love and feel like all animals, yet they will be tortured before they get slaughtered by getting hit and many more awful tortures then they get throwned in hot scalding water and the poor little animals they scream and cry only to die in the most horrific way, and these will happen behind farm and slaughter houses doors, and when that piece of meet gets to you, you will not even blink knowin that this poor animals only came to this world to suffer the humankind evilness. Many people around the world (engineers, biologist, veterinaries, etc) that First af all people you are forgetting the point that this is animal cruelty (and guess what, we are animals too in case you forgot)
Secondly, the point that these poor animals must have been only a couple of days old and never have seen the green of the fields or the warmth of the sun, becuase to humans they are worthless and yet they have the capability to love and feel like all animals, yet they will be tortured before they get slaughtered by getting hit and many more awful tortures then they get throwned in hot scalding water and the poor little animals they scream and cry only to die in the most horrific way, and these will happen behind farm and slaughter houses doors, and when that piece of meet gets to you, you will not even blink knowin that this poor animals only came to this world to suffer the humankind evilness. Many witnessed what happens in slaughter houses and farms have dedicated their lives to fight for their rights and lnform people to be aware that our food has come from dark past. And people continue to fight to let at least farm animals die with dignity, not only they are sacrificed for our sake, why do we have to decide to missinformate people that they are objects, when the truth couldn't be more far, they feel like we do.. And what makes us better? Our evilness?
Anyway if you were an animal unable to tell humans your feeling, i bet you you will cry until you die in the most horrific way possible ... As that is what happens to them.
Therefore, lets not forget that we have to fight for a more compassionate world... And fight for the ones who cannot defend themselves and are tortured everywere.
Animals cruelty is the same as children's abuse.... They are all innocent beings..
By the way this has nothing to do with what you eat it has to do with our duties as the animal with more ""brain"" who are worse than anything in this world... Lets face it we are the only destructive kind in the universe
First af all people you are forgetting the point that this is animal cruelty (and guess what, we are animals too in case you forgot)
Secondly, the point that these poor animals must have been only a couple of days old and never have seen the green of the fields or the warmth of the sun, because to humans they are worthless and yet they have the capability to love and feel like all animals, yet they will be tortured before they get slaughtered by getting hit and many more awful tortures then they get throwned in hot scalding water and the poor little animals they scream and cry only to die in the most horrific way, and these will happen behind farm and slaughter houses doors, and when that piece of meet gets to you, you will not even blink knowin that this poor animals only came to this world to suffer the humankind evilness. Many people around the world (engineers, biologist, veterinaries, etc). who have witnessed what happens in slaughter houses and farms have dedicated their lives to fight for their rights and lnform people to be aware that our food has come from dark past. And people continue to fight to let at least farm animals die with dignity, not only they are sacrificed for our sake, why do we have to decide to misinform people that they are objects, when the truth couldn't be more far, they feel like we do.. And what makes us better? Our evilness?
Anyway if you were an animal unable to tell humans your feeling, i bet you you will cry until you die in the most horrific way possible ... As that is what happens to them.
Therefore, lets not forget that we have to fight for a more compassionate world... And fight for the ones who cannot defend themselves and are tortured everywere.
Animals cruelty is the same as children's abuse.... They are all innocent beings..
By the way this has nothing to do with what you eat it has to do with our duties as the animal with more ""brain"" who are worse than anything in this world... Lets face it we are the only destructive kind in the universe
It depends on your reference point and location on the food-chain...
Do not feed your dogs and they will munch on YOU...
Pigs have been known to EAT their farmers...
In China/Isaan they EAT - Dogs - taste like pig...
Empathy is not just a human trait, but it’s something apes and other animals demonstrate as well. It is just ONE of the things that helps make us HUMAN...
Farmers love their animals, but economics makes them livestock...
There was a satire written by Jonathan Swift, 1729 in Ireland about overpopulation/poverty and perceived solutions...
Where are YOU in the World's food chain???
One thing that us humans should understand is that whatever action animals make, it is their problem. Meaning a cat scratches you or a dog bites, we are not going to punish them. Remember they are still innocent beings that they do not know of evil, even if we do not understand their actions.
Only we know and can choose to be Evil and we are the only ones who posses EVIL, not them. So we should never justify wrong actions. Even peer biologist or Vets or anyone who is involved in the animal kingdom world knows that we do not really understand animals, but whatever they do they are not wicked.
Also, in the wild (or what is left of the Wild ) Lions who are the top of the chain before us, and whatever carnivorous animal who kill to survive, they kill their prey in a way with the least suffering. Lions first choke their prey and so on... and what do we do? TORTURE First... but then again I guess that is why Hell exist to remind us to correct ourselves
MA I appreciate where, I think, you are coming from. However, I must ask:
What color is the sky in your world?
Lol, I know...it's just that reality sucks :( ufff
Bay of Pigs?
The Chinese raise Talapia and send to US this fish you can grow in a back yard hole with water in it yet it is expensive. They feed it pig feces. Now they can feed the talapia with dead rotton pig.Everything that comes from china from water spickets to flashlight has a short if any life expectancy. What the heck wee you thinking Bill Clinton look what you did why dont you repeal that? OH you cant cause we owe too much what a sleezy moron Bill Clinton is. He will probably fly to China and tell them he wil help them with the pigs
Let's face it the Chinese suck. They are just a disgusting as the Japs. They are cruel to their animals and their people.
Make sure you run out to walwart today and buy some more chineese crap!
China needs all the money you can send them so they can fund their communist government!
If it says China on I dont buy it period
I have found many new american suppliers just by searching online.
BFD! We have a lot of dead pigs in Washington, DC! Unfortunately they're in the White House, House of Representatives, and Congress.
ron,
Congress = House of Representatives AND Senate.
Soon water will be one of their most sought after commodities. I seen an article last week were they put fish in the river and they lasted two hours. I`m thinking at what point is the damage irreversible and have we reached it yet?
I won't be ordering any pork dishes from the local Chinese take out in the near future.
Obama is a pig
Last time I saw that many pigs in one place was my ex-wife's sorority reunion.
My name is legion for we are many...
I guess pigs can't swim either.