The impact of food animal welfare on human wellbeing: scientific and Islamic perspectives

• Main Authors: Cho Cho Zaw, Cho Cho Zaw, ., Myat Min @ Mohd Omar
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Global Academic Excellence (GAE) 2019
• Subjects: RA0421 Public health. Hygiene. Preventive Medicine
• Online Access: http://irep.iium.edu.my/73621/1/73621_The%20impact%20of%20food%20animal%20welfare.pdf; http://irep.iium.edu.my/73621/; http://www.ijmtss.com/PDF/IJMTSS-2019-08-06-02.pdf
• Institution: Universiti Islam Antarabangsa Malaysia

Animal warfare includes consideration for all aspects of animal welfare and meeting their physical and mental needs. It generally concerns at keeping, handling, providing nutrition and disease prevention of animals especially in three important stages which are production, transportation, and slaughtering process for food animals. From the holistic medicine point of view, human wellbeing covers all aspects of physical, social, psychological and spiritual. About 80 percent of the human population of the World relies on animals for their food in which the food animals serve as the main source for most of protein, fats, iron, and some vitamins. World Health Organization (WHO) reported that chronic diseases such as obesity, diabetes, cardiovascular and dental diseases, cancer and osteoporosis are related with human diet and nutrition. The welfare of food animals should be considered not only for the sake of animals, but also for human wellbeing because the cruelty to animals is linked with animal stress which in turn have negative effects on human wellbeing. This paper uses the literature search and analytical method. It aims to explore the impact of food animal welfare to human wellbeing with the research scope on the Islamic perspectives as well as the scientific findings in the related area. Islam provides fundamental ethical guidelines in dealing with animals and highlights the importance of halalan toyyiban to achieve meat quality for human wellbeing. The scientific findings supported that mishandling of animals while keeping or slaughtering lead them to face physical and psychological stress which in turn affect the quality of the meat and chances of getting foodborne diseases. Both scientific and Islamic perspectives pointed out the requirement of animal welfare for human well-being. Thus, the welfare of food-producing animals such as ruminants and poultry should not be neglected since they have positive and negative consequences on human wellbeing. The food animal welfare should be implemented and integrated the existing and established guidelines of the meat industry to achieve the optimal value of human wellbeing.