Comment by sandspar
2 years ago
It sounds horrifying but it's hard to tell how much more horrifying it is than the average meat processing plant. They're big, complex, dirty facilities at the best of times. I've never seen the inside of a meat processing plant. Presumably the journalist hasn't either. The situation is bad, yes (69 violations in a year). But I don't know exactly how bad. Overall I'm thankful for the guys who work in these places so that the rest of us can keep our eyes averted from death.
Meat processing is inherently messy, but it should never be dirty. Breaking down a carcass inevitably spreads around a lot of blood and meat scraps, which is precisely why cleaning is so important - there's nothing unhygienic about that debris unless it's allowed to accumulate and fester.
There is no excuse for the kind of violations described in this report, nor is there any excuse for allowing such a dangerous plant to continue operating. In my country, I would expect an inspector to immediately close a plant in such a state; following prosecution, there would be a real possibility of the operators being indefinitely prohibited from operating any food business.
No. Food production is clean, must be clean, and if it is not clean it is not just incompetence it is criminal.
The inspectors and regulatory agencies failed to do their jobs and people died.
What about the actual packer? Why do we not hold them responsible here too? It's all well and good to blame the USDA but they're a check on the packer. It seems like Boar's Head has a cavalier attitude toward product safety that was bound to get a bunch of people killed sooner or later. I realize that this is the norm in these facilities so why do we do nothing to actually regulate them? And why is the focus on how the USDA isn't doing it's job? Clearly the problems are being identified but the actual regulations have no teeth.
> What about the actual packer? Why do we not hold them responsible here too?
exactly. i find it incredibly troubling how often people are willing to blame it on only one party—the reality is, it’s both.
both.
we need to hold these greedy people responsible for cutting costs to the point that they are absolutely responsible for people falling sick and dying. and we need to figure out how we get to a point where the regulators a) are adversarial, and b) have teeth, c) have funding and d) use those teeth.
the tendency towards letting greedy people off the hook is troublesome.
I'm not sure about these slightly down stream, but for actual meat packers they cannot legally operate without UDSA on site moment to moment. USDA should have been responsible for fining and corrective actions long before they started killing people. The stupid thing is that the regulations do have teeth. They can shut you down quite easily.
> It sounds horrifying but it's hard to tell how much more horrifying it is than the average meat processing plant. They're big, complex, dirty facilities at the best of times. I've never seen the inside of a meat processing plant.
How do you say that they're big, complex, dirty facilities at the best of times, then immediately say you haven't ever seen inside one?
> Presumably the journalist hasn't either.
Why would you presume this? Do you presume the inspectors aren't familiar with meat processing either?
> Overall I'm thankful for the guys who work in these places so that the rest of us can keep our eyes averted from death.
Just random praise for the company that is getting busted for horrific health violations. Do you have any praise for the facilities that aren't crawling with vermin and filth?
He said he's thankful for "the guys who work in these plants", which is not the same thing as being thankful for the companies that operate them or their policies. Being thankful for rank-and-file meat processing employees doesn't seem like a crazy sentiment. It's a very tough job.
That's what your focused on? Not the contamination and listeria?
9 people dead so far. So yeah, it's bad.
https://abcnews.go.com/Health/wireStory/death-toll-now-8-lis...
I caught the subtext as "how bad those violations were in relation to the industry" and don't think anyone has cast any doubt on how bad a listeria outbreak is.