30 Chickens For Every Person

Chew on This, a book discussed in today's KidsPost section of the Washington Post, is filled with all sorts of food facts including, About 9 billion chickens are killed for food each year in the United States. That's almost 30 chickens for every person. 9 billion chickens.

Nine billion chickens trapped, wing to wing, toe to toe, in small cages prior to being killed for human consumption. I could rant on and on about how wrong it is that we treat animals like commodities and that, despite all we know about a vegetarian diet, we continue to not only eat animals but to keep them in overcrowded conditions, pump them full of hormones so they will grow faster, and kill them in loud, noxious, and dirty slaughterhouses. But I won't.

9 billion chickens