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Hamburger roulette Losers paralyzed

#1 User is offline   PassedOut 

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Posted 2009-October-04, 08:10

Like making sausage and law, grinding beef can be a messy process: Trail of E. Coli Shows Flaws in Inspection of Ground Beef

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Using a combination of sources — a practice followed by most large producers of fresh and packaged hamburger — allowed Cargill to spend about 25 percent less than it would have for cuts of whole meat.

Those low-grade ingredients are cut from areas of the cow that are more likely to have had contact with feces, which carries E. coli, industry research shows. Yet Cargill, like most meat companies, relies on its suppliers to check for the bacteria and does its own testing only after the ingredients are ground together. The United States Department of Agriculture, which allows grinders to devise their own safety plans, has encouraged them to test ingredients first as a way of increasing the chance of finding contamination.

Unwritten agreements between some companies appear to stand in the way of ingredient testing. Many big slaughterhouses will sell only to grinders who agree not to test their shipments for E. coli, according to officials at two large grinding companies. Slaughterhouses fear that one grinder’s discovery of E. coli will set off a recall of ingredients they sold to others.

Not every company is willing to gamble with the health of its customers:

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The retail giant Costco is one of the few big producers that tests trimmings for E. coli before grinding, a practice it adopted after a New York woman was sickened in 1998 by its hamburger meat, prompting a recall.

Craig Wilson, Costco’s food safety director, said the company decided it could not rely on its suppliers alone. “It’s incumbent upon us,” he said. “If you say, ‘Craig, this is what we’ve done,’ I should be able to go, ‘Cool, I believe you.’ But I’m going to check.”

Costco said it had found E. coli in foreign and domestic beef trimmings and pressured suppliers to fix the problem. But even Costco, with its huge buying power, said it had met resistance from some big slaughterhouses. “Tyson will not supply us,” Mr. Wilson said. “They don’t want us to test.”

Corporations lobby hard to avoid government regulation, but soft regulation comes with its own costs.

I firmly believe in free competitive markets, but also think that resistance to sensible regulation is misguided (and is the refuge of the lazy and the unscrupulous). Companies can compete just as vigorously when strong regulations are enforced as when they are not. And when strong regulations are enforced, responsible companies are not put at a disadvantage against those willing to put their customers at risk to squeeze out more profit.
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#2 User is offline   matmat 

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Posted 2009-October-04, 09:09

fresh raw beef will not kill anyone. Simplest test would be to feed some of the recent trimmings to the slaughterhouse managers and owners. if they refuse to eat it, just ask, "why?"
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#3 User is offline   Al_U_Card 

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Posted 2009-October-04, 12:50

I worked in the meat industry for a short time. Long enough to see the mechanically deboned meat machine (like a car crusher but with a spigot to let the "juice" out.

Recipes with intestines, lips, jowls and snouts are not uncommon. Especially for sausages and hot-dogs. Gives new meaning to the term "100%" beef....lol

Testing in house is pretty stringent and food inspectors are prevalent and reliable. Doesn't stop the occasional error or even "fast-one" (take back a beef brisket with lactobacilli contamination, (milky fluid around the meat in the shrink-rap) rinse, reheat and repackage.......)

Making sure the count on a package of nails is exact is not too much of a worry.....what can kill you or bankrupt you should have correspondingly greater oversight....
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#4 User is offline   Lobowolf 

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Posted 2009-October-05, 12:33

Not that I feel like I need validation for...well...pretty much anything, but every now and then I read something that really makes me glad I'm a vegan.
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#5 User is offline   Al_U_Card 

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Posted 2009-October-05, 13:22

Lobowolf, on Oct 5 2009, 01:33 PM, said:

Not that I feel like I need validation for...well...pretty much anything, but every now and then I read something that really makes me glad I'm a vegan.

So.....you made a choice of pesticides over anti-biotics? :P
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#6 User is offline   vuroth 

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Posted 2009-October-06, 17:21

Wait, bacteria, fungus and yeast don't contaminate vegetables? Happy day!
Still decidedly intermediate - don't take my guesses as authoritative.

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#7 User is offline   Lobowolf 

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Posted 2009-October-06, 17:26

I think it's fair to say that vegetables are "less likely to have contact with feces" than cows, particularly cows in the food industry.

Still waiting on that outbreak of mad tofu disease.


And disease or no disease, this quotation by Al_U_Card would suffice to support my original statement:

Quote

I worked in the meat industry for a short time. Long enough to see the mechanically deboned meat machine (like a car crusher but with a spigot to let the "juice" out.

Recipes with intestines, lips, jowls and snouts are not uncommon. Especially for sausages and hot-dogs. Gives new meaning to the term "100%" beef....lol


That's just me, though. If you like intestines and snouts, then omnivorism is your best bet; the soy substitutes at this time are poor, at best.
1. LSAT tutor for rent.

Call me Desdinova...Eternal Light

C. It's the nexus of the crisis and the origin of storms.

IV: ace 333: pot should be game, idk

e: "Maybe God remembered how cute you were as a carrot."
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