TRANS COWS? Why are male cattle suddenly lactating?

Most consumers assume that beef is one of the simplest foods on their plate. But what happens before cattle reach the dinner table might be more complex — and worse than you think.

“Even with seemingly healthy foods, they actually can be tainted in a way that could have severe health impacts on us. Like say, take beef,” BlazeTV host Sara Gonzales says.

“Beef is good for you,” she continues, “But then you start thinking about cows and all the hormones that get pumped into the cows that then get passed onto us when we eat beef.”

“And apparently these hormones are having such an adverse effect on these cows that I mean, I guess you could say it in a way that it’s turning some of them trans,” she adds.

In a study from West Texas A&M University, just over 20,000 finished cattle originating from 33 feed lots were examined. Among native steers, 14.55% were lactating. Among dairy cross steers, 19.66% were lactating.

And while those doing the research don’t agree with her, regenerative farmer Mollie Englehart believes that this may have to do with the hormones being pumped into the cows.

“I first need to say that the researchers do not agree with my theory,” she tells Gonzales, explaining that Dr. Ty Lawrence, who oversaw the study, believes that it’s “that basically the cattle are just so fat that … the fat itself is becoming an estrogen-producing organ and then signaling the pituitary gland, and there’s a cascade that makes the males lactate.”

However, it is explained in the Merck Veterinary Manual that estradiol, which Englehart says is the “first ingredient in most of these hormone implants that they put in cows’ ears,” has a list of adverse events that involve teat development in both heifers and steers.

“In the ’80s, we tried to decide if we could possibly not have dairy cows have babies and just make milk. And estradiol was used in that study to induce lactation,” she says.

Englehart also points to a claim a British university made previously that transgender women’s milk is just as nutritious as a woman’s milk. They also used estradiol to induce lactation in those men who wanted to breastfeed children.

“So estradiol is a common thing across the whole spectrum,” she adds.

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