-
Study on using ammonia to eliminate E. coli
Beef Products. Inc., a South Dakota company, processes slaughterhouse trimmings to make a lean processed beef product. While the trimmings are susceptible to pathogens, a study commissioned by the company found that they could be killed by injecting the product with ammonia gas to raise its alkalinity. The United States Department of Agriculture, as is often routine, accepted the company's study without conducting its own independent research. Today, the company's product has become a key compon -
Letter from Agriculture Department to Beef Products' representative
Federal officials agreed to Beef Products' request that the ammonia used to treat beef trimmings be considered a "processing aid," and not be listed as an ingredient. The product has remained little known outside industry and government circles. -
The Most Dangerous Job in America: Thousands of meatpacking workers suffer crippling injuries each year. A special report from inside the nation's slaughterhouses. By Eric Schlosser
"The golden rule in meatpacking plants is "The Chain Will Not Stop." USDA inspectors can shut down the line to ensure food safety, but the meatpacking firms do everything possible to keep it moving at top speed. Nothing stands in the way of production, not mechanical failures, breakdowns, accidents. Forklifts crash, saws overheat, workers drop knives, workers get cut, workers collapse and lie unconscious on the floor, as dripping carcasses sway past them, and the chain keeps going." -
Letter from Georgia health officials to Beef Products
"A food processing plant in Milledgeville, Ga., was making meat loaf for state prisons when officials detected "a very strong odor of ammonia" in a newly opened box from Beef Products. The officials destroyed 4,000 pounds of meat loaf and called in state inspectors, who sent 6,000 pounds of the unused product back to Beef Products. The company defended the ammonia levels, saying they had been approved by the Food and Drug Administration." -
Study commissioned by company
According to a research study, the fatty slaughterhouse trimmings used by Beef Products "typically include most of the material from the outer surfaces of the carcass" and contain "larger microbiological populations." Beef Products says it also uses trimmings from inner cuts of beef, and that all the material is approved by the U.S.D.A. Study also cites the alkalinity resulting from the ammonia treatment, and "the potential issues surrounding the palatability of a pH-9.5 product." -
Testing records uncover pathogens
Inside the meat industry, the product has been subject to private testing. In 2006, Cargill, which had more than 50 vendors, suspended three facilities for having excessive salmonella in their shipments; two of them were Beef Products plants, confidential company records show. -
Report from U.S.D.A. on E. coli testing
Federal officials endorsed the treatment of beef with ammonia, saying "scientific studies support that this step serves as an antimicrobial intervention that reduces E. coli O157:H7 in beef manufacturing trimmings to an undetectable level." The officials said the process was so effective that the product could be sold to hamburger-makers without the routine testing begun by the U.S.D.A. in 2007 of beef used in making hamburger. -
Letter to U.S.D.A.
After batches of salmonella-tainted product led to suspension of company's Kansas plant from the federal school lunch program, Beef Products official pointed out that the company had lowered the alkalinity of the beef to combat "ammonia aroma. -
Letter from Food Safety and Inspection Service to company representative
After The Times asked the U.S.D.A. about the discovery of pathogens in the ammonia-treated product, the department told the company it would no longer exempt the product from routine testing or recalls.
