PETA’s ‘Lettuce Lady’ to Sustain Frustrated D.C. Tourists During Shutdown

Lettuce Leaf–Clad Lovelies Say Health Insurance Showdown Should Give Everyone Pause to Consider Healthy Food Handouts at Federal Triangle 

For Immediate Release:
October 2, 2013

Contact:
Sophia Charchuk 202-483-7382

Washington — The museums, the Washington Monument, and the national parks remain closed, but PETA’s “Lettuce Ladies”—who wear only strategically placed lettuce leaves—are open for business today at the Federal Triangle Metro station to make a point about preventive health care and give disappointed tourists something to write home about. The ladies are dishing up free vegan fried “chicken” sandwiches from D.C.’s Everlasting Life Cafe and telling tourists how going vegan can help prevent the many debilitating health conditions—including heart disease and diabetes—that have caused U.S. health insurance rates to go through the roof, employers to despair at sick-leave absenteeism, and health-care services to be overloaded. Photos from today’s event will be available this afternoon.  

“Steering clear of cholesterol- and saturated fat–laden meat, eggs, and dairy products is one of the best ways to avoid a shutdown—an artery shutdown, that is,” says Lettuce Lady Ashley Byrne. “PETA wants everyone to know that while the debate over health insurance rages on, you can lower your health-care costs and your cholesterol by choosing vegan meals.”

Meat, eggs, and dairy products contain no fiber and are loaded with artery-clogging saturated fat and cholesterol. According to the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, vegans are less prone to heart disease, diabetes, obesity, and cancer—conditions that take a major toll on health-care costs through cholesterol-lowering medications, diabetes drugs, and chemotherapy treatments, among other treatments—than meat-eaters are. And in addition to being responsible for the daily suffering and terrifying deaths of billions of animals, the meat industry is also one of the biggest producers of the greenhouse-gas emissions that contribute to climate change.

For more information, please visit PETA.org.