Washington - Some U.S. slaughterhouses routinely skin live cattle, immerse squealing pigs in scalding water and abuse still-conscious animals in other ways to keep production lines moving quickly, two current and former U.S. Agriculture Department employees said Thursday.
Federal law requiring slaughterhouses to kill animals humanely before dismembering them has been increasingly ignored as meat plants grow bigger, said Steve Cockerham, a USDA inspector at a Nebraska plant, and former USDA veterinarian Lester Friedlander, who worked at meat plants.
Cockerham told a news conference he often saw plant workers cut the feet, ears and udders off cattle that were conscious on the production line after stun guns failed to work properly.
"They were still blinking and moving. It's a sickening thing to see," he said.
Cockerham and Friedlander blamed the alleged abuse on the economics of the meat industry. As the U.S. meat industry has consolidated in the past decade to cut costs, slaughterhouses have sped up production lines so that some are butchering an animal every three seconds.
About half the beef processed in the United States is handled by a half-dozen companies.
USDA inspectors are generally stationed at holding pens to check the health of arriving live animals, and at the end of the production line to examine carcasses.
In between, plant workers stun the animals, cut their throats, skin them, cut off their heads and remove internal organs. Pigs are also dipped into 140-degree Fahrenheit (60-degree Celsius) rinses to remove their hair.
But USDA and meat industry officials said animals were mostly treated humanely, not just due to the law but also for economic reasons.
"There is no incentive for the industry to treat animals other than the most humane way possible," said Janet Riley, a spokeswoman for the American Meat Institute. "Livestock are our raw materials and hurting them makes as much sense as Detroit auto workers putting dents in the cars they make."
She said that animals that were stressed immediately before slaughter produced sub-standard meat because of adrenalin and muscular changes.
Friedlander, a Pennsylvania veterinarian who worked for the USDA until 1995, said that meat inspectors were discouraged by USDA officials from reporting any mistreatment of animals. Complaints made by inspectors were often ignored, he said.
"It's a situation that put me at odds with the USDA and that's why I left," Friedlander said. "Sometimes the wheels of justice turn slowly, but the wheels of justice at USDA don't even turn."
Gail Eisnitz, an author of a new book about slaughterhouses and an employee of the Humane Farming Association, said the USDA should be able to slap meat firms with criminal penalties if plant workers abuse animals.
"This kind of mistreatment is standard practice in the industry," she said.
An animal with a leg caught in a holding pen is often dragged out with a hook and chain "while you hear bones breaking," Eisnitz said. Cattle and pigs transported to slaughter in sub-zero temperatures sometimes freeze to the side of trucks before they arrive, she said.
The U.S. meat industry last year urged members to adopt guidelines for handling animals, which were suggested by Temple Grandin, an internationally respected animal expert in Colorado.
In a study commissioned by the USDA, Grandin recommended installing non-slip floor grating so animals move easily, daily maintenance of stun guns and minimal use of electric prods.
The USDA's Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) recently completed a survey of 61 U.S. meat plants' treatment of animals before they were slaughtered. The report, which has not yet been made public, showed no significant problems, the USDA said.
"Our survey showed the problems are not widespread," said Bonnie Buntain, a USDA official who prepared the survey. "And when we found any problem, it went directly to the district offices of FSIS and follow-up action was taken."
The USDA hopes that slaughterhouses will adopt performance measures and record-keeping practices like those required for food safety.
"The industry is now paying a lot more attention to food safety because of the need to have critical control points in the manufacturing process," Buntain said. "I think the same sort of philosophy is going to happen in the humane area, too."
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