Posted on 04/15/2025 11:24:12 AM PDT by BenLurkin
When President Trump recently griped about Europe's distaste for buying American chicken, his comments touched on a long-running and divisive trade spat that's flared up from time to time.
Europeans disparage U.S. poultry as "chlorinated chicken," or "Chlorhünchen" in the German press, and see it as possibly unsafe.
The phrase refers to the use of chlorine in poultry processing plants after the birds have been slaughtered in order to cut down on harmful bacteria that are frequent sources of food-borne illness like Salmonella and Campylobacter.
Rinsing poultry in chlorine was common practice in the U.S. when the European Union first passed a ban in 1997 that prohibited chlorine and other so-called "pathogen reduction treatments."
Over the weekend, the U.K. business secretary Jonathan Reynolds said his country will "never change" its food standards" when asked during a Sky News interview if "chlorinated chicken was on the table or off the table" during trade talks.
It's not surprising the specter of chlorine-soaked chicken has staying power for European consumers.
But the accuracy of the term has eroded over the years.
"The vast majority of chicken processed in the United States is not chilled in chlorine and hasn't been for quite a few years," says Dianna Bourassa, an applied poultry microbiologist at Auburn University, "So that's not the issue."
Less than 5% of poultry processing facilities still use chlorine in rinses and sprays, according to the National Chicken Council, an industry group that surveyed its members. (Those that still do use a highly diluted solution at concentrations deemed safe.)
Nowadays, the industry mostly uses organic acids to reduce cross contamination, primarily peracetic, or peroxyacetic acid, which is essentially a mixture of vinegar and hydrogen peroxide.
Bourassa says this is typically used as part of the chilling process. Poultry carcasses are immersed in cold water with a dilution of peroxyacetic acid.
"It extends shelf life and very significantly reduces the number of bacteria," she says.
Moving away from chlorine has let the U.S. export poultry to other countries that prohibit chlorine, but the U.K. and European Union are still off limits because they don't allow any chemical treatment of their poultry.
While there may be a "yuck" factor for consumers, the chemicals themselves are not really the driving concern for overseas regulators.
European authorities have analyzed the use of the chemical washes and found they don't pose a risk to human health at the concentrations used in poultry processing.
In the U.S., it's not even required to disclose on the label of the poultry what chemical was used to process the chicken.
The European prohibition centers on the belief that disinfecting poultry with chemicals is, in essence, a way to mask subpar food safety in the U.S. industry.
"European regulators are seeing the antimicrobial washes as a band-aid to cover up what's really a lack of adequate hygiene," says Sarah Sorscher, director of regulatory affairs at the Center for Science in the Public Interest, a consumer advocacy group.
"Our practices are essentially, in their minds, inadequate," she says.
The U.S. poultry industry rejects this argument and has pushed for the EU to roll back its rules on imports.
So is poultry in the U.S. more likely to make you sick? It's challenging to accurately compare rates of foodborne illness linked to poultry in the U.S. and Europe because of how the data are generated.
The EU cites data that its "integrated" approach to food safety dropped cases of Salmonella by nearly 50% over five years when it was implemented in the early 2000s.
"Fundamentally, the regulations are very different," says Byron D. Chaves, a food microbiologist at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln who studies poultry processing.
Europe relies on "pre-harvest interventions," to reduce pathogens when the animal is still alive, including vaccination and different types of additives that are used in feed. Whereas the U.S. tends to focus on chemicals and other strategies to kill pathogens once the animal is already slaughtered.
Sorscher argues American producers should heed their European counterparts and try to emulate their "farm to fork" approach, not lobby to have those countries change their standards to accommodate the U.S.
But Chaves says it's not accurate to say European standards are necessarily more stringent or safer.
"I would be very cautious about pushing that narrative," he says.
European consumers are likely more risk averse than U.S. consumers and have different values, which is also reflected in their rules, he says. Europe tends to operate on the "precautionary principle" when it comes to food safety.
But Chaves says the prevalence of infection from Salmonella and Campylobacter is very high in both Europe and the U.S. And research finds neither region's approach is entirely effective at eliminating the risk.
Much of our chicken is raised here, then sent to China for processing and sent back to the U.S. Heaven only knows what the filthy Chinese dose the chicken with to make it presentable after its long ocean voyage.
I never knew this, but Perp says there is a gast difference.
https://www.perplexity.ai/search/how-much-chlorine-is-in-our-ch-7CmwkY2oSUupfiP72IYbWw
gast = taste
Chicken: “I was in the pool!”
I wouldn’t have believed that, but yeah... Looks true.
https://www.perplexity.ai/search/does-the-us-send-chickens-to-c-Nmbanxe4QUmLkrrgRLeBlw
Do they know about ... Shrinkage?
Chicken have it tuff they don’t die of old age must be their looks?.
I still use the same method my mother used in preparing chicken.
My fresh killed chicken after defeathering and gutting sits in brined (Salt) water overnight. I rinse the fowl in clear water before cooking.
Seems to work for me.
There is zero scientific evidence that either chlorine or other chemical washes they dunk the chicken breasts in in order to kill the bacteria on them is harmful to human health. None. Zero. So they can't claim its "unhealthy".
No, their complaint is that it works too well. Its too effective....meaning you could have dirtier chicken houses yet still produce perfectly safe chicken because this process is so effective at killing germs and bacteria. So based on nothing more than the suspicion that health standards in the poultry industry are lower in the US but can be compensated for by a chlorine wash of the chicken meat, the EU and UK have banned it.
In the same way that gosh, they'll just have to ban those American high tech companies for allowing free speech on their platforms. EVEN INCLUDING US Citizen Musk interviewing US candidate Donald Trump in America for a US election on his own platform. YES! They actually said/did this!
Personally I think we ought to say American roads are allergic to European cars and therefore we can't have any cars produced in Europe on our roads. Hey, its just as reasonable.
I only buy chicken, eggs, beef, pork, etc... from local farmers that I know and trust. More expensive? Sure, but worth it, it is processed locally, and tastes better too.
Got to tour a hog processing plant that I was doing some work on. The place smelled like oranges. They used orange oil to keep the equipment clean. Orange oil is very expensive.
NPR hates America.
So the Europeans prefer that vaccinations and different types of additives be ingested and injected by and into the chicken so the consumers can ingest them while eating their “sanitized” chicken, rather than a wash over the outer surfaces, which can be washed off after purchase.
No wonder the EU is in such a turmoil with people running on vaccinations and different types of additives. I do remember that Germans liked to hang their beef until fly maggots had tenderized it - then they would scrape off the rotted bits.
“Risk averse” is just another word for “chicken shyt.”
‘More expensive? Sure, but worth it, it is processed locally, and tastes better too.’
U.S. chicken is 30–70% cheaper than most European markets, with extreme differences in high-cost countries like Switzerland. — cheaper to use chlorine to disinfect.
Foodborne illness rates linked to chicken consumption in the U.S. vs. Europe:
Campylobacteriosis
U.S.: 19.5 cases per 100,000 people (2019 data).
EU/UK: 98.4 cases per 100,000 (UK, 2018)
Salmonellosis
U.S.: 17.1 cases per 100,000 (2019).
EU/UK: 14.3 cases per 100,000 (UK, 2018)
U.S. chicken: 30–58% Campylobacter prevalence, ~24% Salmonella.
EU chicken: Lower Salmonella but higher Campylobacter detection, partly due to cold-air chilling (no antimicrobial washes)
Bottom line: Your European / UK chicken costs a lot more but it’s worth it! You get sick a lot more often from Euro/UK chicken.
” Four Chinese plants were approved by 2013 to process U.S.-origin chickens into cooked products (e.g., canned soups, frozen meals) for export back to America.
Operational reality:
While technically possible since 2013, evidence suggests minimal implementation:
No regular shipments: The National Chicken Council stated there “have not been any shipments” of U.S. chickens sent to China for processing and return.”
Doing that is INSANE. Sending the chicken 10,000 miles to process it??? WTH?
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