Dear Letters Editor

The way animals are killed in slaughterhouses is something most of us don’t want to think about but the incredible fact that nearly two-and-a-half million are slaughtered each day means it is an issue we can’t ignore. People like to believe that animals are killed humanely but almost none of us ever set foot in these places and the truth is very different. In fact, millions of animals suffer pain and fear when they are improperly stunned before slaughter and may fail to lose consciousness at all, facing a violent and terrifying death. Around a quarter of all pigs are now killed using gas chambers but the gas mixtures used in most of them cause huge distress to the animals before they eventually lose consciousness. Long delays between electrical stunning and the knifing which actually kills the animals means that millions more recover consciousness while bleeding to death. These shocking facts are well known but the Government will take no action and the slaughterhouses themselves are only interested in maximizing the speed at which they turn living creatures into cuts of meat.

Luckily, each of us has the power to do something about this. By becoming vegetarian we stop supporting this brutal business and reduce the number of animals enduring this fate: on average, each vegetarian saves over a thousand animals from the abattoir. For more information about slaughter or going veggie, contact Viva! at 8 York Court, Wilder St, Bristol BS2 8QH, tel 0117 944 1000.

Yours sincerely