Horses can suffer worse than slaughter

Horses in America are revered and woven into our culture. Specifically, horses are an important part of life in Lake County as evidenced by the multitude of horse properties, show barns, trails, and various clubs. I personally invest a substantial amount of time and money in horses and in horse related events, and count myself among those who care about horses a great deal.

A recent letter encourages Sen. Kirk to vote to withhold funding for government inspections of horse slaughter plants in the hopes of keeping these plants from operating at all. The letter states that foreign demand for horse meat should not be underwritten by U.S. taxpayers.

While that statement is true, U.S. taxpayers do own horses, and the prolonged economic downturn is just but one cause for literally thousands of horses to be neglected leaving them to suffer unimaginably from parasites, thrush, starvation, and overcrowding. Without the option to send to humane slaughter, these animals are left to die a slow and painful deaths or be loaded onto stock trailers and shipped to Mexico where the methods of handling and death are far less regulated than it would be in the U.S. with trained personal.

The writer of the letter and I have at least one thing in common: a real concern for the well-being of horses.

I've seen what neglect looks like and support the only practical and humane solution to the current overpopulation to end suffering. The letter writer, while well intentioned, offers no solution to the problem, which leads to more suffering.

Keith Gray

Metttawa