Usda Beef Quotes

A nationwide study published by the USDA in 1996 found that [...] 78.6 percent of the ground beef contained microbes that are spread primarily by fecal matter. The medical literature on the causes of food poisoning is full of euphemisms and dry scientific terms: coliform levels, aerobic plate counts, sorbitol, MacConkey agar, and so on. Behind them lies a simple explanation for why eating hamburger meat makes you sick: There is shit in the meat.

A nationwide study published by the USDA in 1996 found that 7.5 percent of the ground beef samples taken at processing plants were contaminated with Salmonella, 11.7 percent were contaminated with Listeria monocytogenes, 30 percent were contaminated with Staphylococcus aureus, and 53.3 percent were contaminated with Clostridium perfringens.

Widespread introduction of the process [of irradiating foods] has thus far been impeded, however, by a reluctance among consumers to eat things that have been exposed to radiation. According to current USDA regulations, irradiated meat must be identified with a special label and with a radura (the internationally recognized symbol of radiation). The Beef Industry Food Safety Council - whose members include the meatpacking and fast food giants - has asked the USDA to change its rules and make the labeling of irradiated meat completely voluntary. The meatpacking industry is also working hard to get rid of the word 'irradiation,; much preferring the phrase 'cold pasteurization.'...From a purely scientific point of view, irradiation may be safe and effective. But he [a slaughterhouse engineer] is concerned about the introduction of highly complex electromagnetic and nuclear technology into slaughterhouses with a largely illiterate, non-English-speaking workforce.

[from an entry by her daughter Camille] On the other hand, if cattle remain on pasture right to the end, that kind of beef is called "grass finished." The difference between this and CAFO beef are not just relevant to how kindly you feel about animals: meat and eggs of pastured animals also have a measurably different nutrient composition. A lot of recent research has been published on this subject, which is slowly reaching the public. USDA studies found much lower levels of saturated fats and higher vitamin E, beta-carotene, and omega-3 levels in meat from cattle fattened on pasture grasses (their natural diet), compared with CAFO animals ... Free-range beef also has less danger of bacterial contamination because feeding on grass maintains normal levels of acidity in the animal's stomach. At the risk of making you not want to sit at my table, I should tell you that the high-acid stomachs of grain-fed cattle commonly harbor acid-resistant strains of E. coli that are very dangerous to humans ... Free-range grazing is not just kinder to the animals and the surrounding environment; it produces an entirely different product.

Our government’s laws, subsidies, and diet education efforts (grain-based USDA food pyramid, anyone?) are seemingly driven more by lobbyists for the beef, grain, and dairy industries than by unbiased scientific evaluation and concern for human health.

A major factor influencing the nation’s dietary policies is the revolving door that shuttles industry leaders into roles as legislators and government regulators, then back into industry. Members of the USDA have had known associations with the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association, the National Pork Board, the National Livestock and Meat Board, the American Egg Board, ConAgra Foods, the National Dairy Council, and Dairy Management Inc.4,5 In other words, health care, nutrition policy, and agribusiness are all tucked cozily together in a king-size bed.

Between 1989 and 2009, the price that consumers paid for beef in the grocery store rose 60 percent. But the price of cattle rose only 12 percent. The price of pork in the grocery store rose 50 percent in that time, while the price of hogs on the farm actually fell 11.5 percent. The USDA couldn’t determine the gap for chicken because there wasn’t a good way to determine the price on the farm. In a vertically integrated system the company always owned the birds, and it kept the prices confidential.

beef industry, that was very good news. But a few Americans were not reassured. They weren’t convinced the USDA had done what it could to protect them. They knew that the agency’s image as a protector of consumers was part myth, because the

Pork Pork is produced from young animals and is less variable in quality than beef. The USDA rates pork according to two quality levels: acceptable and unacceptable.Δ

The USDA has been in cahoots with these guys since its inception in 1862, because it has always had the dual mandate of protecting American agricultural interests and advising the public about food choices. In plain speak, this is called “the fox guarding the henhouse.” Or as my father likes to say, “This would be like having Al Capone do your taxes.

In 1995, the meat industry did everything it could to stop the USDA from implementing food-safety regulations that would require testing for salmonella in ground beef.