Fwd: [SoFlaVegans] The Truth Behind the Spinach Scare: Cheap Beef

[Guest guest]

Note: forwarded message attached.Ronald A. Fells

N3VPU

Amateur Radio Operator

How low will we go? Check out Messenger’s low PC-to-Phone call rates.

 

 

 

 

The Truth Behind the Spinach Scare: Cheap Beef

By Christopher Wanjek

LiveScience’s Bad Medicine Columnist

26 September 2006

 

http://www.livescience.com/humanbiology/060926_bad_ecoli.html

 

When in Mexico, the saying goes, don't drink the

water. You shouldn't eat the spinach either because

it could be contaminated with the E. coli strain that

has sickened close to 200 people in the United States

and killed at least one, likely more.

 

The problem is our food production system is so

complex that most of us cannot be certain where our

food comes from. Even the U.S. government, after two

weeks on the case of the spinach E. coli outbreak, has

narrowed the source to, oh, somewhere in central

California.

 

Gee, you think? California produces about

three-fourths of the nation's fresh spinach, and

Salinas Valley accounts for about three-fourths of

that. These guys are sharp. But they aren't looking

closely enough.

 

There are two ways for the U.S. government to greatly

minimize the risk of an E. coli outbreak: start

supporting local farming and stop mass-producing

cattle, the true source of E. coli. Neither will

happen soon, however, because it infringes on the

American pursuit of cheap, crappy food.

 

You excrete billions

 

E. coli, short for Escherichia coli, is a bacterium

with hundreds of strains, most of which are relatively

harmless in healthy individuals. E. coli is

ubiquitous is the guts of cows and humans and is

spread from cow to cow and from human to human through

feces.

 

Humans excrete billions of E. coli bacteria with each

bowel movement, which is why hand-washing is so

important.

 

Cows don't have the luxury of hand-washing. When they

are cramped into pens, ankle-deep in the manure of

hundreds to thousands of cows, E. coli tends to

spread. Bacteria can splash up on udders and get into

milk; or get into intestines and contaminate meat

during the slaughtering process; or pass through the

cow in manure and ultimately end up on crops directly

as fertilizer or indirectly by leaching into the water

supply.

 

Most E. coli outbreaks in the United States are caused

by a particular virulent and deadly strain called

O157:H7. If you eat, you are at risk.

 

Meat eaters are at risk because most beef is loaded

with harmful bacteria, often the bad E. coli, and

needs to be cooked. Vegetarians aren't spared, as

evidenced by the spinach E. coli outbreak. Organic

consumers aren't spared; organic spinach can have E.

coli. And raw food advocates are most certainly at

risk, because cooking is the best way to kill the

bacteria.

 

Local food is best

 

It's September. Every state in the union can grow

spinach. In fact, spinach is largely a cool-weather

spring and fall crop. Why is California growing all

of our spinach?

 

At work are the perverse forces of economic markets,

not the forces of nature. The U.S. food production

system has been fined-tuned to maximize profits for a

small group of farmers, often corporations, holding

vast acres of land.

 

Spinach from small, local farms could very well be

contaminated with E. coli O157:H7. It simply wouldn't

spread to other states, or to other cities for that

matter. Health authorities would be able to identify

the source of the bad E. coli within hours. And tons

of safe spinach sold around the country wouldn't need

to be recalled " just in case, " as is the case now.

 

Small-scale farming inherently means fewer hands and

fewer opportunities for contamination---bacterial,

viral or parasitic---from field to fork. So while the

small, local guys aren't immune to the kind of

contamination problems that plague the big guys, the

odds are in their favor.

 

Big, fat cows

 

While some food safety experts are unfairly bashing

organic farmers and their reliance on manure for

fertilizer, the real culprit behind E. coli outbreaks

is the industrial beef and cattle industry. First,

certified organic farmers are prohibited from using

raw manure for 90 days before harvest of food for

humans. Second, most organic farmers compost their

manure, which kills most E. coli.

 

Industrial beef and dairy farms are disease-ridden

cesspools. A growing body of evidence suggests that

corn-fed cattle have higher counts of E. coli O157:H7

compared to free-range, grass-fed cattle, which seem

largely free from this bacterium. The reason is

twofold: Free-rangers come in less contact with each

others' manure compared to stressed-out cattle packed

in feeding lots; and corn makes the cow's stomach

juices more acidic, which gives rise to the

acid-loving O157:H7 strain.

 

Also, mega-farms cannot get rid of their tons of

O157:H7-rich manure. This sits in cesspools and

ultimately contaminates the surrounding environment.

 

Switching back to free-range, grass-fed cattle would

solve this problem. But beef would be more expensive,

and some view this as a bad thing despite the epidemic

of obesity and diabetes and the clear link between

high beef consumption and colon cancer.

 

Zap those buggers

 

Look for Band-Aid solutions touted in the weeks to

come, such as irradiation, with its cute, deceptive

nickname of cold pasteurization. Irradiation entails

zapping food with gamma rays, X-rays or electrons to

deactivate harmful bacteria along with other stuff

helpful in the food, like vitamins.

 

But with the unnatural process of irradiation, we can

continue the unnatural but cheap practice of feeding

cows corn, which they can't digest, so we can continue

the unnatural process of consuming lots and lots of

this modern invention called the cow.

 

Then maybe we can counter any adverse human health

effects with expensive surgery or drug therapy. It's

the American way.

 

Christopher Wanjek is the author of the books “Bad

Medicine” and “Food At Work.” Got a question about Bad

Medicine? Email Wanjek. If it’s really bad, he just

might answer it in a future column. Bad Medicine

appears each Tuesday on LIveScience.

 

Live Simply So That

Others May Simply Live

Yoga-With-Nancy/

SignSoFla/

SoFlaVegans/

SoFlaSchools/