Search results: kfc

The Guardian’s Mike Davis says Mexican swine flu is “a genetic chimera probably conceived in the faecal mire of an industrial pigsty.”  No wonder the pork industry is so upset about the bad publicity caused by swine flu.  Their solution to this problem?  Call it something else.  This worked and the official name of the disease is now Influenza A (H1N1).    No direct evidence, it seems, links pork CAFOs (confined animal feeding operations) to this particular strain of H1N1 to human influenza.  Of course there is no direct evidence.  Nobody has been looking for it.

But now Canada has found some pigs sick with H1N1 at a farm in Alberta.  Oops again.  The World Health Organization (WHO) thinks the pigs caught the disease from a farm worker who had traveled to Mexico.  WHO reports nearly 900 cases worldwide.  As for the U.S., the New York Times has a nifty map of where the cases have been found.

Scientists have been worrying about transmission of swine flu to people for some time.  In 2003, Science magazine noted that the classic swine flu virus, H1N1, was mutating rapidly, suggesting that neither pigs nor people could remain immune to it.  And nobody was doing any surveillance for swine flu.  The Institute of Medicine, also worried, published major reports on the threat, prevention, and treatment of pandemic flu.

These days, the CDC is monitoring the situation and reports the U.S. case count is up to 226 (as of May 3).  The CDC also reports international cases and describes specific cases in California and Texas.  And, it notes, the virus is becoming increasingly resistant to antiviral drugs.  But not to worry.  It doesn’t look H1N1 will turn out to be a big worldwide pandemic like the deadly one in 1918.  At least not this time.

Yum Brands, which owns KFC, Taco Bell, and Pizza Hut, is going to post calories on the menu boards at all those places.  The company must see the writing on the wall and is just getting a head start on what is sure to come.  Part of the writing comes from California, which has just passed a statewide calorie labeling law.  This particular law is hailed by some advocates as an major step forward and by others as a complete sell-out since it doesn’t really go into effect until 2011 (brochures will be required by July 2009).  This, of course, gives state and national Restaurant Associations, which have fiercely opposed such initiatives, plenty of time to litigate.

And then there is the fraud problem?  According to bloggers, class action suits have been filed accusing restaurant chains of lying about the number of calories.  From what I see in New York City, the calories posted are so high that it’s hard to believe they could be any higher.