There's a 25% chance your supermarket ground beef contains antibiotic-resistant fatal bacteria

[Luminous Animal]

22. Your source is incorrect. It had nothing to do organic fertilizer.

Last edited Fri Dec 30, 2011, 04:00 AM - Edit history (1)

The FDA and the CDC investigated and concluded thus: the investigators were able to match environmental samples of E.coli O157:H7 from one field to the strain that had caused the outbreak. Potential environmental risk factors for E.coli O157:H7 contamination at or near the field included the presence of wild pigs, the proximity of irrigation wells used to grow produce for ready-to-eat packaging, and surface waterways exposed to feces from cattle and wildlife.
http://www.fda.gov/NewsEvents/Newsroom/PressAnnouncements/2007/ucm108873.htm



Grass-fed does not mean that the cows are pastured. Current regulations allow beef to be labeled grass-fed even though they are kept confined, fed little else but hay. Such conditions, of course breed and spread pathogens and these kind of grass-feed ranchers rely heavily on hormones and antibiotics to control disease. Cows that are actually pastured on a well-managed ranch (that is, the cows have the freedom to roam and have access to a wide variety of mature but not old clovers and grasses) will rarely get sick and neither will the humans eating the meat... even when raw.

Cage-free eggs is a meaningless designation. Yes, the chickens are not confined to cages and they have more inches to roam but they roam by the thousands in enclosed low sheds. Antibiotics are not only permitted but heavily used. The so-called free-range chickens and their eggs are housed the same way but a small door is open during the day to allow the chickens to go outside if they choose. But, regulations allow chicken farmers to keep that door closed for the 1st five weeks of the chickens lives (they are slaughtered at 7 weeks). As Michael Pollan put it:

"Since the food and water and flock remain inside the shed, and since the little doors remain shut until the birds are at least five weeks old and well settled in their habits, the chickens apparently see no reason to venture out into what must seem to them an unfamiliar and terrifying world. Since the birds are slaughtered at seven weeks, free range turns out to be not so much a lifestyle for these chickens as a two-week vacation option."