The bold statement was met with instant Twitter backlash. Even fellow vegans were critical of the overly simplistic and scientifically erroneous statement made by the musician.
"It would be awfully nice if I could just eat my vegan food in peace and not have to apologise for stupid shit that other vegans say all the time," one critic tweeted.
"You're the fictional insufferably smug vegan stereotype that everyone hates except you're here and you're real," harshly tweeted another.
Talking to Metro.co.uk, Richard Reithinger, vice-president of Global Health, RTI International gave his thoughts on Moby's controversial statement:
"Consumption of meat and animal products are only one of the many ways that pathogens can spillover from animals to humans. Other channels include animal husbandry or contamination of foods through animal fluids/faeces. Ultimately, the reason why increased spillover events are happening are because of our increased contact and encroachment with wildlife—which is more a symptom of resource scarcity and population growth."
Many Twitter commenter raised the issue of the prolific bubonic and pneumonic plague that swept the world in the 1600s, which is known to have been spread by fleas, carried on rats.
"How would going vegan have stopped infected flees biting humans during the plague?" asked one Twitter user.
While another sarcastically replied: "Fleas will be vegan too. And rats. It's just a matter of pointing at them sternly."
Other savvy tweets drew attention to other epidemics over the years that are thought to have been unrelated to the consumption of animal meat.
"Bubonic plague, Leptospirosis, SARS, and Zika have entered the chat to slap you", tweeted one critic.
In addition, some felt the need to point out that animal byproducts are used in many life saving medicines and treatments.
"In a vegan world, there would not have been a vaccine for smallpox. In a vegan world, there wouldn't be supply of heparin to save 100 M human lives every year," read one tweet.
This is not the first time Moby has made similar claims about the power of veganism to change the world. Just weeks ago he posted to Instagram that "every year human beings kill over 150 billion animals…leading to pandemics, deforestation, climate change, water pollution, cancer, diabetes, and heart disease."
Moby has long been a staunch advocate for veganism, to the point of having "animal rights" tattooed on his arms and "vegan for life" tattooed on his neck.
Meanwhile Moby was unable to sustain his vegan restaurant, Little Pine, during the pandemic, with financial pressures forcing him to sell the Silver Lake, California-based eatery.
Staff at the time were critical of the Go hitmaker for not doing more to protect their income during Covid-forced lockdowns, claiming that they were left "high and dry". The restaurant, which Moby started in 2015, has since reopened with new owners.
