Perhaps cattle belches are least of Colorado’s problems
Re: “Cattle belches a focus of bill,” March 31 news story
Just when you thought nothing could top Monday’s much-anticipated total solar eclipse, something does.
Case in point. Colorado’s U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet is sponsoring the “Emit Less Act.” In short, this bill aims to curb cattle, goats and sheep from doing what cattle, goats and sheep have done since when they were residents of Noah’s Ark. Fart and belch. This is perceived as an issue that needs to be addressed?
How about addressing real issues faced by Coloradans now, Sen. Bennet?
Well over half of Colorado families are living paycheck to paycheck.
Nearly 5% of Coloradans are without health insurance.
No one is going to argue that Colorado, and more specifically, greater Denver, has an acute homelessness situation and it is getting worse. This situation has been directly responsible for business closures in downtown Denver as they owners feared for their staff and clientele safety.
The average median rent in the metro area, according to HUD’S 2023 calculation of fair market value is up year over year 15.8%. The cost of living (food, utilities, transportation and health care) is currently clocking in at 7% above the national average.
These are the crises we in Colorado are facing now, senator, and they are why you were elected and sent to Washington — not for studying farm animals farting and belching.
Seriously? — Matthew Revitte, Greeley
Rather than change the diet of cattle in an attempt to reduce methane emissions, people should instead change their diets to reduce the use of animal products or, better yet, go plantbased.
The harms to the environment from raising cattle go way beyond the release of methane from cow burps. These include habitat loss and degradation (41% of U.S. lands are used for cattle grazing and growing crops to feed them), huge amounts of water consumption, water pollution, air pollution and species loss.
Human health can be adversely impacted by eating too much beef: think heart disease, obesity, cancers, antibiotic resistance and zoonotic disease. Breaking news confirms that bird flu has been transmitted to humans from cows; this is very worrying but not at all surprising.
The list of harms doesn’t begin to touch upon the horrors of both the beef and dairy industries on the cattle themselves. In their short lives they suffer privations, confinement and health impacts from selective breeding before they are killed or stunned by captive bolt and sometimes butchered while still conscious.
— Judy Greenfield, Denver