Article et sondage sur l'interdiction du foie gras à Chicago

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Poll : Do you agree with the foie gras ban?
- Yes
- No
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Yes= 39.7%( 4798 responses)

No = 60.3% (7294 responses)
12092 total réponses

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/chicago/chi-0610130253oct13,1,231026.story


Restaurant experts extend to aldermen new feel on foie gras

By Emma Graves Fitzsimmons
Tribune staff reporter
Published October 13, 2006


As he munched tortilla espanola covered in peach salsa Thursday morning, Ald. Burton Natarus was asked to imagine that he was a duck being force-fed cornmeal through a metal tube.

[b]"The lining of their throat is the same as your hand," said Dr. Lawrence Bartholf, a New York veterinarian who then asked the alderman to extend his hand.
With an uneasy look, Natarus (42nd) complied, even as the doctor ran the handle of a knife down the length of his palm to simulate a force-feeding.

"Does it hurt?" the veterinarian asked. "No," the alderman responded.

That experiment, Natarus said, gave him more confidence that he can persuade other aldermen to support a repeal of Chicago's controversial ban on foie gras, a delicacy made from the fattened livers of ducks or geese.

"Unless someone like this gentlemen ... explains it, we're lost," Natarus said.[/b]


Bartholf's visit to a Navy Pier restaurant was the latest chapter in the foie gras drama, which has pitted animal-welfare activists against restaurant owners over the practice. Natarus, who filed an ordinance in August to repeal the ban, is working with the Illinois Restaurant Association, which accused the City Council of overstepping its authority in a recent lawsuit.

At Thursday's breakfast meeting, Bartholf was joined by a scientist from a research facility in France to make the case that research doesn't support critics' claims that the practice is inhumane.

"Clearly, I would not like to be force-fed," said Daniel Guemene, a senior scientist at the National Institute of Agronomic Research in France, who has tested the effect of force-feeding on ducks and geese. "I expected an indication of pain, but there was none."

The two men made presentations to three other aldermen over breakfast and to local restaurant owners and chefs over lunch. The conversation at times turned to the technical--levels of stress hormones and heart rates of the birds during feedingand to the bizarre--whether to bring live ducks to City Hall.

"You know, I think we should ban cooked cabbage," said Ald. Leslie Hairston (5th).

"Because it smells bad!" chimed in local chef Didier Durand, who has begrudgingly taken foie gras off the menu at his Cafe Simone Parisian Cabaret.

Guemene presented results from what he said were peer-reviewed clinical experiments in France that showed force-feeding produces little or no measurable pain or stress in the ducks.

Bartholf, the former president of the New York State Veterinary Medical Society, shared observations from his trips to Hudson Valley Foie Gras, the country's largest foie gras farm, which he said slaughters 7,000 ducks a week. He called the birds' living conditions "extremely comfortable" and said videos presented to the City Council's Health Committee of waterfowl in distress did not reflect what he had seen.

"These birds are not frightened," he said.

Based on those views, Ald. Shirley Coleman (16th) and Howard Brookins Jr. (21st) said they would rethink their initial votes to ban foie gras.

"It is not as cruel to the bird as they made it out to be," Brookins said, noting the ban had been approved by a voice vote without much thought.

"It's opened my eyes. I'm really searching for the right side on the moral and the ethical," said Coleman, who is on the council's Health Committee. "We're trying to be a global city. I'm not sure if it's my job to tell restaurants what they can or cannot sell."

In order to repeal the ban, the measure must first receive a majority of votes from the Health Committee, and then a majority from the full council.

Advocates of putting foie gras back on restaurant tables are confident they have secured enough votes in the full council once the measure comes out of committee, said Illinois Restaurant Association President Colleen McShane.

National animal-rights activists said the two scientists did not represent the majority of their peers related to force-feeding waterfowl. Fifteen countries have banned foie gras, and even Pope Benedict XVI has condemned it, said Paul Shapiro of the Humane Society of the U.S.

"An overwhelming number of veterinarians and animal scientists firmly believe forcing these animals to consume exponentially more foods than they would on their own is cruel and inhumane," Shapiro said. "To cause so much cruelty for such a trivial product is a shame."

Ald. Joe Moore (49th), who proposed the ban, said he expected the ban to stick, noting that it was passed by an overwhelming 48-1 victory.

"It's pretty well established by the scientists and veterinarians who testified in committee that it is inhumane," Moore said. "I'm ready to move on."

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efitzsimmons@tribune.com



Copyright 2006, Chicago Tribune

[Animal 0]

qu'est-ce qu'ils n'inventeraient pas comme mensonges pour continuer de vendre leurs «foies d'oiseaux malades et torturés » !

[animo-aequoanimo 0]

N'oubliez pas de voter aussi :

39.8%
Yes (4821 responses)

60.2%
No (7297 responses)

12118 total responses