USDA pilot program fails to stop contaminated meat

WaPo ^

[chessplayer]

A meat inspection program that the Agriculture Department plans to roll out in pork plants nationwide has repeatedly failed to stop the production of contaminated meat at American and foreign plants that have already adopted the approach, documents and interviews show.

The program allows meat producers to increase the speed of processing lines by as much as 20 percent and cuts the number of USDA safety inspectors at each plant in half, replacing them with private inspectors EMPLOYED BY MEAT COMPANIES. The approach has been used for more than a decade by five American hog plants under a pilot program.

But three of these plants were among the 10 worst offenders in the country for health and safety violations, with serious lapses that included FAILING TO REMOVE FECAL MATTER from meat, according to a report this spring by the USDA inspector general. The plant with the worst record by far was one of the five in the pilot program.

[chessplayer]

Companies hiring their own inspectors. Gee, what could go wrong? sarc/ You can be sure these company honchos won't be eating or feeding their families contaminated meat. They will make sure it's nice and clean. Everyone else? Well, let them eat s**t! Oh, well, who cares. It's for profits.

[Bronzy]

>>>Companies hiring their own inspectors.<<<

Guess that means more government.

[goodwithagun]

Yet Big Gov is trying to shut down, by over regulation, the family operated small business that processes the meat I buy from a local farmer. Lovely.

[Valpal1]

Exactly. It’s time to end federal oversight and go back to state or local inspectors.

The USDA has become the bottleneck in our nation’s food supply.

[loungitude]

I have seen a modern hog-plant, up close. It’s not pretty.
I have also seen a modern beef-plant, up close. It’s not pretty either.
And,
I love bacon cheese-burgers!

[chessplayer]

I have seen a modern hog-plant, up close. It’s not pretty.
I have also seen a modern beef-plant, up close. It’s not pretty either.
And,
I love bacon cheese-burgers!

---

We all know the plants aren’t pretty. The point is that it looks like they aren’t even bothering to remove fecal matter before they give it to customers.

[Ken H]

That’s because they should be flying planes, not inspecting meat. Duh!

[vetvetdoug]

The military had their own meat inspectors up until 1975 when the Army Inspectors were caught taking bribes at meat packing plants. The illegal activities went all the way up to the top of the DPSC. A Congressional investigation found around 75 active duty and civilian personnel involved in the million dollar scheme. The USDA took over the plants and everything went smooth and was happy thereafter.