For years the slaughterhouse hire all kind of people. When they hire this people they do not warn
them of the risk of infection, diease, or even injuries that a slaughterhouse workercan get on the job. The are
two types of infection E.coli and Salomnella.
Some of these workers are immigrants that come to American. The immigrants works come over on
boats or others walk or other get smuggled by vehicles. Not all immigrants are illegal, some immigrants come
here with a working visa. These visa may have ran out, they did not renew it and this make them illegal
immigrants. This could be a problem for the illegal immigrants because they could be deported. They come to
America to find work and a better life for their family in first place. Meat Packaging Plants ( Tyson, Perdue,
Smithfield and IBP) put classified in Mexico paper. When they hired this immigrants they would drive truck
to Mexico and pick them up. They get hired in industry that is very dangerous because they are willing work
full time, work weekends and work overtime. Meatpacking companies are the most dangerous job in United
States. In 1998, 29.3 percent of meat workers suffered injury or illness, compared to 9.7 percent for the rest
of manufacturing. Unlike the chicken facilities, automation in beef packing plants is limited because cattle
come in all shapes, size and the knife remains the most important tool. There are companies under enormous
pressure to speed up their lines, which does lead to injuries and dangerous food .The three meat packing
giants ConAgra, IBP and Excel (the meat division of Cargill Inc.) try to increase their earning by producing
bigger volume at each plant. Speeding up lines mean that the workers do not get anytime to clean or sharpen
their knives, which can lead to repetitive stress injuries, ultimately and dirty food. In cattle their intestines
often can carry dangerous pathogens such as E. coli and are supposed to be kept away from meat, but when
the line goes faster it can lead to more intestinal spillage onto meat. Slaughterhouse employee's looked
forward to packing beef bound for the European Union, because companies slowed the lines then so the
meat would pass stricter EU inspections. Some of the potential sources of injuries in the meatpacking
industry are: Line speed up leading to repetitive injuries. In 1996, employee's were listed as having the
highest rate of repeat trauma disorders (For example, carpal tunnel syndrome which develop over long
periods of time). Close-quarters cutting can lead to lacerations from the worker's own knives or their
neighbors. For example, according to an OSHA "publication, one worker in a meatpacking plant was
blinded when the knife he was using to pick a ham prior to boning slipped out of the ham, striking him in the
face." Back injuries can because by heavy lifting. Long hours leading to fatigue and errors on the job. The
workers have inadequate training and equipment. Although recorded rates of injury and illness among
meatpacking employee's are extremely high, it's likely that the official numbers are still not do justice of any
the truth.
Plant managers and owners have been known to keep false logs that misrepresent the actual
occurrence of injury and illness because meatpacking plants are fined when their plants show high injury
rates. When immigrants come they are tested for diseases and treated but when they come here illegal they
do not get the proper testing and treatment. One of the disease that U.S. test for is Tuberculosis ( TB ). TB
cases come from Mexico, Philippines and Vietnam, by large. The reason why this happen is because they do
not have the correct paper, health insurance and money to go to the doctor to get check out for the disease.
All cattle herds may carry at least 44 percent bacterium and as there is no test to determine which cows have
carriers we must assume that all they have E.Coli O157. Ground beef, ground lamb, unpasteurised milk and
products made from unpasteurised milk such as some cheeses are foods source that microbiologists have
pinpointed to have E.Coli O157 in it. Since 1983 in Scotland unpasteurised milk was banned. It is still being
legally sold in England and Wales known to present danger to the young, the elderly, the immuno
compromised and pregnant women. Products are not always labeled as unpasteurised or raw. when
pasteurized milk fail to meet the correct temperature it can be very good source of infection to humans.
It is more likely that the ground (minced) beef contain E.Coli O157 than a single joint of the meat because
any contamination on a joint will be on the outside only and thorough cooking it should destroy any bacteria.
However, when they grounding beef from several animals can be used. If there was only one animal infected
this would result in the whole batch being affected. Also, as the meat is ground, the bacteria are passed from
the outside and spread throughout.
Cargill is the nation's largest private company since 2008 has earned in $116.6 billion in a year.
Like other meat processing plantOne prominent slaughterhouse, Greater Omaha Packing, slaughters 2,600
cattle every day, in a facility "the size of four football fields." Other stomach-turning phrases of note in this
section of the
Times article about typical slaughterhouse procedures: "cattle often arrive with smears of
feedlot feces," "workers slicing away the hide can inadvertently spread feces to the meat" and "large clamps
that hold the hide during processing sometimes slip and smear the meat with feces."and not the USDA -- is in
charge of devising and executing its own safety procedures. Until this week, Cargill had not supplied meat to
Costco, one of the few big producers to test its suppliers' meat, because of Costco's testing requirements.
American Foodservice, which grinds an average of 1 million pounds of beef a day, said slaughterhouses often
refuse to supply to processors who test their sources for E. coli.Employee's that work at a poultry factility
will be a carrier of Salomnella.
Moreover, most of the bacteria we tested from all types of contaminated chicken showed resistance to one
or more antibiotics, including some fed to chickens to speed their growth and those prescribed to humans to
treat infections. The findings suggest that some people who are sickened by chicken might need to try several
antibiotics before finding one that works.In the largest national analysis of contamination and antibiotic
resistance in store-bought chicken ever published, we tested 525 fresh, whole broilers bought at
supermarkets, mass merchandisers, gourmet shops, and natural-food stores in 23 states last spring.
Represented in our tests were four leading brands (Foster Farms, Perdue, Pilgrim’s Pride, and Tyson) and
10 organic and 12 nonorganic no-antibiotics brands, including three that are "air chilled" in a newer
slaughterhouse process designed to reduce contamination. Among our findings:Campylobacter was present
in 81 percent of the chickens, salmonella in 15 percent; both bacteria in 13 percent. Only 17 percent had
neither pathogen. That’s the lowest percentage of clean birds in all four of our tests since 1998, and far less
than the 51 percent of clean birds we found for our 2003 report.No major brand fared better than others
overall. Foster Farms, Pilgrim’s Pride, and Tyson chickens were lower in salmonella incidence than Perdue,
but they were higher in campylobacter.There was an exception to the poor showing of most premium
chickens. As in our previous tests, Ranger--a no-antibiotics brand sold in the Northwest--was extremely
clean. Of the 10 samples we analyzed, none had salmonella, and only two had campylobacter.Among all
brands, 84 percent of the salmonella and 67 percent of the campylobacter organisms we analyzed showed
resistance to one or more antibiotics. Chickens become contaminated in many ways, among them by pecking
at insects that pick up bacteria from the environment, pecking at droppings that carry germs, or drinking
contaminated water. Both salmonella andcampylobacter colonize the birds’ intestines (usually without harm),
but birds typically harbor more campylobacter than salmonella, and it spreads through flocks faster.
Among the measures taken to limit bacteria in chicken houses: disinfecting coops that may hold as many as
30,000 birds, shielding against bacterial carriers such as insects and rodents, ensuring that feed is clean, and
using powerful ventilation systems to keep the chickens’ bedding drier and less inviting to germs. But when a
chicken is slaughtered, bacteria in its digestive tract can wind up on its carcass, where some hide in feather
follicles.
To keep contamination in check, processors follow procedures collectively known as HACCP
(pronounced hass-ip). The initials stand for Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point, the consumer’s main
protection against contaminated chicken. HACCP requires companies to spell out where contamination
could be controlled during processing, then build in procedures such as scalding carcasses to prevent it.
But HACCP testing show the current practices aren’t enough. Bell & Evans is organic chicken farm. Bell &
Evans, producer of broilers raised without antibiotics, spent $30 million to modernize its processing plant in
2005, including $9 million for a high-tech air-chill system designed in part to reduce cross-contamination. The
system whisks carcasses on two miles of track through chambers in which they’re misted and chilled with air,
then submerged in an antimicrobial dip. Tom Stone, the company’s marketing director, says the measures
helped reduce the rate of salmonella to less than 3 percent in recent in-house tests of chickens done before
packaging. But in our tests of 28 store-bought chickens, 5 of the Bell & Evans samples had salmonella and
19 had campylobacter. When contaminated chickens arrive at supermarkets, problems can multiply. Just one
slip-up in storage, handling, or cooking, and you’re at risk. Both salmonella and campylobacter can cause
intestinal distress, and campylobacter can also lead to meningitis, arthritis, and Guillain-Barré syndrome, a
neurological disorder. Campylobacter and salmonella from all food sources sickened more than 3.4 million
Americans and killed more than 700, according to the latest estimates from the federal Centers for Disease
Control and Prevention, dating from 1999. The CDC notes that the rate of laboratory-confirmed infections
has decreased somewhat since 2001. However, the toll may be far higher than the numbers indicate because
only a small percentage of foodborne illnesses are reported to public-health authorities. The CDC said that in
2004, poultry was involved in 24 percent of outbreaks in which a single product was identified, up from 20
percent in 1998. Also in 2004, the CDC noted, 53 percent of campylobacter samples and 18 percent of
salmonella samples were resistant to at least one antibiotic.
Among the major brands, campylobacter incidence ranged from 74 percent, in Perdue, to 89
percent, in Tyson. Samples from organic and no-antibiotics brands, as a group, averaged within that
range.Salmonella incidence in Foster Farms, Tyson, and Pilgrim’s Pride was 3 percent, 5 percent, and 8
percent, respectively--notably lower than in the organic and no-antibiotics types, which had an overall
incidence of roughly 25 percent.None of Ranger’s 10 samples harbored salmonella. When we took bacteria
samples from contaminated broilers and tested for sensitivity to antibiotics, there was evidence of resistance
not just to individual drugs but to multiple classes of drugs. That indicates there may be fewer to choose
from, and infections may be more stubborn. We didn’t have enough data to assess whether there were
differences in resistance among brands.It’s not surprising that we found antibiotic-resistant bacteria even in
chickens that were raised without antibiotics: Those germs are widespread and can persist in the
environment. Twenty percent of campylobacter samples were resistant to ciprofloxacin (Cipro), a drug
similar to the one the U.S. Food and Drug Administration banned chicken producers from using as of
September 2005 to protect its effectiveness in people.Inspectors for the USDA’s Food Safety and
Inspection Service (FSIS) check carcasses in each plant and reject those with visible fecal matter, defects,
and signs of illness. They also collect one broiler on each of 51 consecutive days of chicken production and
have it tested for salmonella. Plants that produce more than 12 salmonella-positive samples during that time
fail to meet the minimum federal standard. When a plant fails, the USDA can suspend chicken production,
but it has no authority to levy fines and can’t close plants by withdrawing inspectors solely because a plant
doesn’t meet the federal salmonella standard, a federal court ruled in 2001. To get processors to clean up
their act, the USDA threatened in February 2006 to publicly disclose processors’ salmonella test results. A
nonprofit group beat the agency to it. In July 2006, Food & Water Watch, an environmental health
organization based in Washington, D.C., published the names of 106 chicken processing plants--including
some operated by the four leading brands we tested--that failed federal salmonella standards in at least one
test period between 1998 and 2005. When we contacted those four companies for comment, all said
they’ve taken steps to reduce salmonella contamination. In August 2006, the USDA reported that the rate of
positive salmonella tests in broilers had jumped to 16.3 percent in 2005, up from 11.5 percent in 2002.
Richard Lobb, a spokesman for the National Chicken Council, a trade group, said it’s not clear why the rate
went up in 2005, but he cited preliminary government data indicating that it has since declined. Cohen of the
FSIS added that the agency has begun an initiative aimed at curbing salmonella by focusing on plants that
failed the federal standard or had problems meeting it. That leaves campylobacter. Now that a test method
was recently valid. the USDA has announced it will begin collecting data on campylobacter in broilers in
processing plants nationwide. It’s too soon to say whether data collection will lead to a federal limit and
routine testing, he added. Based on our tests, that’s what needs to happen. All indications are that it won’t be
easy to banish campylobacter, but the government can start by implementing a realistic standard, then start
testing and monitoring in processing plants. Some of the chicken producers we asked said they already target
campylobacter in HACCP plans. Others said they assume that what works against salmonella will also work
against campylobacter. Clearly, it does not. The USDA has moved at glacial speeds on controlling
campylobacter in the chicken industry. For more on how the government can make food safer you can look
on the internet. The single largest factor contributing to worker injuries is the speed at which the animals are
killed and processed. In an industry where profit margins are slim and volume is everything, workers are
endlessly pressured to kill more animals in less time. Rather than regulate line speeds for the interest of
worker safety, line speed is limited only by federal sanitation laws.Most facilities operate nearly 24 hours a
day 7 days a week - killing and processing hundreds or thousands of animals each hour. As one worker
stated: The line is so fast there is no time to sharpen the knife. The knife gets dull and you have to cut harder.
That's when it really starts to hurt, and that's when you cut yourself.
Inclusion some people eat their steak medium rear but we do not know if that blood has E.coli in it.
That why we should alway cook are red meat well done. So we do not end up in the hospital with E.coli
symptoms. Chicken plant work are carriers of Salomnella because they would are arould the chicken from
the egg to slaughthouse. The slaughter house itself can be dangerous place itself because of all the blood on
the flood, and the knife and the speed lines.
I thought it was intersting at the Roof Top Farm today. I like how she let us harvest carrots and eat them.I also like the view it was very beautiful. The information she gave use was very useful too. I didn't know that certain vegetable can grow in the winter and be more healthier for you. Here is my picture I too.
