SALMONELLA -FREE CHICKEN? YOU BET. SWEDEN DID IT. WHY NOT THE  U.S.


THE KUHNS REPORT

LAS VEGAS - Hello America, and how is the world treating you?

Some of my editorial is taken from a fine article that recently appeared in the Los Angeles Times. So I will cite instances from  the article entitled;  "Salmonella-free Chicken."

Recently there was a serious salmonella outbreak across the country that sickened hundreds of people because they ate chicken from Foster Farms. What gripes me is that Foster Farms refused to recall the suspected tainted chicken that was shipped from their plant. Foster Farms said that "salmonella-tainted poultry" is safe to eat if thoroughly cooked. Wow! that's like Foster Farms saying, - -okay, there is unsanitary conditions and contaminated equipment at the plant which allow bad bacteria and animal poop to saturate the meat but - -hey! That's okay. Just cook it thoroughly consumer. Can you imagine the arrogance of this company?

It may well be true that cooking the chicken thoroughly will kill the bacteria but Come On! If the salmonella was caught in the beginning stages the contaminated chicken would not ever have to be shipped out to consumers. A word of praise to COSTCO stores. They sold rotisserie chickens from Foster Farms and recalled tens of thousands of pounds of poultry after finding salmonella even in the cooked chicken.

What it shows is that the chicken producers are blaming the  salmonella tainted outbreak on the customer. Telling us to "just cook the bad meat thoroughly."

What really concerns me is that the Consumer Union's testing found rates of contamination in Foster Farms chicken to be HIGHER than in other major brands, 29 percent compared with only 6 percent for Perdue Chicken and 7 percent for Tyson Chicken.

Now to bring the point home lets look at the difference between our governments safety precautions versus Sweden.

Sweden's government makes it perfectly clear that it's consuming public does not have to turn their kitchen into a hospital and/or clinic in order to prepare their chicken dinner. Sweden's inspection system is outstanding. They test the product at multiple  key production points, starting at the  hatchery. Any infected egg or animals MUST be destroyed; then, inspection and cleanup procedures prevent contamination of equipment or other animals. NOTHING is shipped from a facility where salmonella has been found until all animals are inspected and declared " salmonella- free." The nice thing about their inspection process is that - - THE ENTIRE process is paid for by the poultry industry.

In addition, Sweden does not allow poultry operations to fight salmonella with the preventative use of antibiotics, which has been linked to the rise of resistant strains.

BUT people, The United States poultry industry continues to pump antibiotics into our chicken supply as a preventive move against salmonella. My though on that? It's bad policy, bad practice, bad for the food and bad for the consuming public. Pumping antibiotics into the chickens and permeating the chicken meat with those antibiotics is wrong.

The article made a good point - - basically it was this: For to long now, in the United States, the agriculture industry has  successfully pushed and prodded  Congress and regulatory agencies(through lobbying efforts, political contributions, latent bribery, trips, and freebies) into accepting practices that are literally sickening the public, the consumer.  I submit that we the consuming public insist that the USDA and the agricultural operations are mandated and compelled to recall ALL infected products. Better yet, why not adopt the same requirements in the U.S. that Sweden has in place? It has been working very well there. It protects the consumer and you would think that is what the United States regulatory agencies would want for us here in this country. And, the best part is it could be put into place very quickly and would not cost us taxpayers any money. It would be paid for by our poultry industry.- And, that's my opinion. Make your own decisions. You decide.

Bradley W. Kuhns, Ph.D., O.M.D.
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Dr. Kuhns can be reached by email at:
bradleykuhns@gmail.com