We Deserve Better - Food quality!

foreverloved

Long but great read! Read this today and I think everyone should learn about our terrible meat suppliers!!

http://allrecipes.com/cook/13432715/blogentry.aspx?postid=246212

My little City of Eastvale welcomed the opening of McDonald's last month. Cars lined up for as long as 45 minutes, circling the building and blocking the main road to secure their family a 'treat' of Big Mac's and fries. You would have thought they were giving away season passes to Disneyland.

I posted several comments on a local residents web site - which were not very well received. That lead to a discussion of ammoniated beef products and ever present danger of E.coli contaminated beef in fast food hamburger. Within less than 24 hours my comments were deleted by the moderators as "Off Topic, Political and inflammatory"

Within days, I read the story of Will Todd - a little boy who was fighting for his life after contacting E.coli. I was hopping mad.

One year old Will was diagnosed with e.Coli 0157 h7, the worse kind, (unfortunately, they have no idea how) which led to HUS and subsequently, kidney failure. Then his bowel (lower intestine) became perforated and a large portion became necrotic (dead) so they had to remove it.

http://williamantoniotodd.blogspot.com/2011/07/william-antonio-todd-fundraising-page.html<

Then came the recall of 36 MILLION lbs of Turkey recalled for Salmonella Heidelberg.

Now I am really angry! And most people in my community don't get it!

This type of Salmonella is resistant to three common antibiotics, ampicillin, streptomycin and tetracycline. One person has died and as many as 80 people have fallen ill. Mind you, this is August 2011 - the first illness was reported in March 2011. For 5 months, the processing plant responsible was allowed to continue to produce tainted meat until finally someone died!

WHY?

The United States Department of Agriculture, allows grinders to devise their own safety plans. Even with a safety plan, of their own choosing in place, that plan is not always adhered to.

Have you noticed that whenever a food is recalled the wording always says "Such and such Corp has voluntary recalled......" ?

Unlike pharmaceuticals where the FDA can require a product be recalled ALL food recalls are voluntary.

Because salmonella is so common in poultry, it is not illegal for meat to be tainted with this pathogen. Food microbiological limits for bacteria and mold are exponentially greater for foods than for pharmaceuticals. Sick people are at risk - therefore even the chocolate on a laxitive has to be darned close to pure - not so with chocolate sold on the shelves of our stores. Don't the very young, eldery and ill eat food?

Unwritten agreements between some companies stand in the way of ingredient testing. Many big slaughterhouses will only sell beef to grinders who agree to NOT test their shipments for E.coli. Some slaughterhouses fear that one grinder's discovery of E.coli will set off a recall of ingredients sold to others. Unlike salmonella, it is illegal to knowingly sell E.coli tainted meat.

Therefore, if all the meat from various sources is ground together and then tests positive for E.coli it is almost impossible to trace the source of the contaminated ground meat.

Cargill - the processor of this tainted ground turkey could have voluntarily recalled the meat in March - they didn't - indeed they waited until there were enough illnesses that the CDC got involved.

Someone dies and then they "voluntarily" recall the tainted meat.

According to the CDC 48 million people get sick and more than 3,000 die each year from food poisoning in the United States.

One in six Americans gets sick each year from tainted food each year.

Have you heard of Cargill?

If you eat, Cargill has somewhere along the line, handled your food. Maintaining a low profile is exactly what this company attempts to do. You won't see the name anywhere on the packaging - because they sell through other companies. They are the processor and supplier of our food supply.

Cargill is the largest privately owned company in the world.
In 2008, the company’s revenues sat at 116.6 billion dollars, employing 149,000 people in 63 countries. It is certainly surprising that such a company can maintain such a low profile as they do.

Antibiotic resistant Salmonella:

According to the FDA , farmers who raise food producing animals use about 29 MILLION pounds of antibiotics each year.
That four times as much as doctors prescribe to people.


"Animals are given antibiotics for a number of reasons — including to get them to grow faster," explains Gail Hansen, a veterinarian who works for the Pew Campaign on Human Health and Industrial Farming. "[Antibiotics] are given to perfectly healthy animals to convert their food more efficiently so they can get to market faster."

Is there any wonder that there are antibiotic resistant strains of Salmonella, E.Coli and other pathogens?

The CDC recommends that the ground turkey be cooked to 165 to kill the pathogens. What about cross contamination? The cutting board, the paper towels, the sponge and dish cloth?

What is being done to effectively protect our food supply?
As far as I can see, not enough.

After a four year long study the USDA has drafted rules for how the industry should handle E.coli testing but the proposal has been stalled and they have failed to implement new testing standards.

Instead of waiting for the USDA to act, Costco began requiring its suppliers of bagged produce, including salad greens and mixes, apple slices and baby carrots to test for a broad range of toxic E.coli. Costco also requires that their meat suppliers allow for testing prior to grinding meat. They employ their own inspectors - if a food supplier will not allow Costco inspectors on the premises - Costco declines to buy from them. Notice that Costco carries Foster Farms chicken.

The meat industry treats most of its practices and the ingredients in ground beef as trade secrets. While the Department of Agriculture has inspectors posted in plants and has access to production records, it also guards those secrets.

Our food supply is not transparent - sure you can see cows grazing across the grassy fields, you can see acres of crops growing - from there the vision of our food supply appears to go underground until it reappears on the shelves of the grocery stores. Neatly and cleanly packaged.

Eating ground meat is a gamble. Neither the system meant to make meat safe, nor the meat itself, is what consumers have been led to believe.

We deserve better.

birdlover97111

I am fortunate because my hubby hunts and he takes care of the meat right down to grinding it himself...

lkm111

I agree, we deserve better, but companies like Cargill spend more on lobbyists than on food safety. Don't even get me started on Monsanto and GMO seeds.

Thanks for highlighting this important issue!

mea9

First of all I’m sorry you are being essentially gagged by your local media and your community. It’s deeply frustration and really scary to find that we don’t have the rights we thought were secure. Whatever people think of what you had to say, you had the right to say it.

Second, I am very concerned about our food too. Big business seems to be winning. Taking out good parts of food and selling it separately and replacing with cheap substitute (peanut oil in peanut butter is now hydrogenated vegetable oil – buy peanut oil separately at a higher price). Prices aren’t going down so it’s just a cash grab. Know why were fat? That big Costco muffin with the fake oil and sugar is 600 calories! They’re not using sugar anymore it’s glucose or High-fructose corn syrup. A great big steaming cup of diabetes but it’s cheaper (for them). Don’t even get me started on GMOs.

It’s hard to know what to do. Where are our elected officials? Don’t think you are alone. You really have to be careful what you eat and where you buy it. Individuals have to take back control of their food, make choices and start cooking at home – from scratch as it were:-) You can make your own bread, yoghurt, iced cream, and pickles. Salsa and hummus are fast and easy. Jar sauces? Not! The words fast and food don’t belong together. There is another side. Check out “Slow Food”.

mea9

BTW have you looked at what's in your commercial pet "food"?