‘COVID-19 Chicken’ to Circle Local Grocery Stores With Vegan Message

Mobile PETA Ad Will Urge People to Eat as if Everyone’s Life Depends on It, Because It Does: Meat Comes From Filthy Factory Farms Rife With Disease

For Immediate Release:
May 15, 2020

Contact:
Megan Wiltsie 202-483-7382

As the state begins to reopen after being hit hard by COVID-19—and as slaughterhouses across the country scramble to contain outbreaks of the illness among workers—a PETA mobile billboard will drive by four local grocery stores on Saturday to remind people that the meat industry breeds killer diseases and urge them to shop vegan.

“As long as animals are packed on top of one another at filthy meat markets and factory farms, we risk another pandemic,” says PETA President Ingrid Newkirk. “PETA is eager to put an end to virus hotspots of blood and guts and to help people stay healthy—and we’ve got free vegan starter kits, free vegan mentor services, and free tips to get the ball rolling.”

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warns that approximately 75% of recently emerged infectious diseases affecting humans originated in other animals, including chickens and pigs. PETA (whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to eat”) notes that U.S. factory farms and slaughterhouses are as filthy as China’s “wet markets,” their floors covered with blood, urine, feces, and offal—and a meat shortage doesn’t mean a food shortage, because no one needs to eat meat and the vegan food supply is strong.

Resources on PETA’s website include vegan starter kits and a list of vegan-friendly restaurant chains, many of which are still offering takeout during the pandemic. PETA opposes speciesism, a human-supremacist worldview. For more information, please visit PETA.org.

The mobile billboard will visit Whole Foods Market at 7635 N. Academy Blvd., Natural Grocers at 7298 N. Academy Blvd., Walmart Supercenter at 8250 Razorback Rd., and Sprouts Farmers Market at 1730 Dublin Blvd.