USDA considering privatizing meat/poultry inspection! WTF/ACTION

[Smilo]

(Originally posted in wrong thread)

Don't like shit in your meat/poultry? Well too bad cause if the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) moves forward with plans to privatize part of its meat and poultry inspection program that's what you'll get.


Under the current rules, the USDA’s Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) is responsible for inspecting all chicken and turkey carcasses for things like bruises, bile, and yes, shit, before they’re sent for further processing. The proposed HACCP-Based Inspection Models Project (HIMP) would remove those USDA inspectors from the lines, leaving poultry plant employees, who already stand in a fast moving I-Love-Lucy style line to flag unsanitary or otherwise flawed birds
It's a plain and simple job cutting, money saving measure. The program is projected to save FSIS up to $95 million over three years, and to give a $250 million boost to poultry companies.

“All [HIMP] really is, is a way to dramatically lower quality and standards,” says Amanda Hitt, director of the Government Accountability Project’s Food Integrity Campaign. Poultry, she adds, “shouldn’t have feathers, scabs, blisters and pustules. It shouldn’t have feces in the cavity. These are all things that now, under HIMP, are going to be left to the plants to deal with.”

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/04/03/1080201/-USDA-considering-privatizing-meat-poultry-inspection-WTF-ACTION?detail=hide


Come on DU - let's vote this down - we can not have private companies inspecting our food supply.

[Ezlivin]

1. I'm a vegetarian and I'm not shocked

I quit eating meat after reading Jonathan Safran Foer's "Eating Animals."

I had read Upton Sinclair's "The Jungle" and how the lack of regulation basically allowed the meat packers to ignore good food-handling practices. I thought we'd put behind us those practices.

But it's apparent that if you wish to eat inexpensive meat in this country you will have to forgo any regulations on how it's produced or handled. I understand that it's not possible for everyone to eat organic, free-range, cage-free, hormone-free meat because of the expense.

I'm glad I'm a vegetarian and I feel nothing but pity for meat eaters in this country: They've been fucked over by the industry.

[liberal N proud]

2. Someone has figured out a way to make millions on it

[sendero]

3. I'm fine with this...

.. so long as the CEO and everyone involved with an inspection are subject to PRISON SENTENCES should someone die of a food-borne infection they missed.

Otherwise, I don't think so.

[RC]

4. That should be happening anyway.

Or we could do like China does when one of their criminal business men get international attention...

[deadinsider]

5. Damn I hate this socialist government nt

[Ruby the Liberal]

6. Kicking for the weekend crowd...

[Kablooie]

7. Upton Sinclair, where are you?