I have heard anything on this, thanks for sharing, it's getting harder to run a market now a days. wonder if a few extra hours will be allowed for all the paper work  lol 

THIS IS TOTAL INSANITY! 

This makes no sense to me what so ever: a new measure that will improve the agency's ability to determine the source of food-born illnesses linked to ground beef, stopping foodborne illness outbreaks sooner when they occur.

This statement was put out by USDA in 2014!!!!!!Once a major threat to the beef industry, the levels of E. coli O157:H7 in ground beef have been on a historic decline since peaking in the mid-1990s. In fact, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), levels of E. coli infections today are less than half of what they were in 1996…

DID USDA REACH OUT TO FOOD RETAILERS IN FORMULATING THIS "NEW REDICULOUS RULING"?

THERE IS A LAW CALLED (THE PAPERWORK REDUCTION LAW) REGULATED BY (OMB) OFFICE OF MANAGEMENT AND BUDGET. WAS USDA GIVEN THE APPROVAL TO ASSERTAIN MORE OR POSSIBLY DUPLICATE INFORMATION FROM RETAILERS??

WHERE IS THE ECONOMIC STUDY THAT SHOULD HAVE BEEN DONE ON LABOR COST INCREASES AT SUPERMARKET LEVEL? TO WHAT EXTENT WAS THAT DONE? WHAT ASSUMPTIONS WERE USED AS ECONOMIC PERAMITERS? 

 USDA USES THE WORD (LOTS). A LOT HAS TO BE WEIGHED.TO RECORD ALL OF THE LOTS WILL REQUIRE MORE WEIGHING OF GROUND BEEF MATERIAL THUS CAUSING MORE TIME AND LABOR. HOW CAN SUPERMARKETS RECOUP THESE ADDITIONAL COSTS?

 A SMALL AMOUNT OF POTENTIAL HARMFUL BACTERIA COULD CONTAMINATE AN ENTIRE LOT OF GROUND BEEF: HOW DOES ADDITIONAL DOCUMENTATION OF INDIVIDUAL LOTS HELP USDA TO IMPROVE ITS ABILITY TO CONDUCT RECALLS?

DOSEN'T USDA KNOW THAT 150,000 ECOLI BACTERIA CAN FIT ON THE HEAD OF A PIN? AND WORST YET ECOLI-0157:h7 CAN ACCUMULATE AS MUCH AS 250,000 ON THE HEAD OF A PIN!!

AND IT ONLY TAKES 10 TO 50 OF THEM TO KILL A CHILD OR A GRANDMOTHER!!

WHAT THE USDA IS ASKING THE SUPERMARKET INDUSTRY TO DO IS FIND A NEEDLE IN A HAySTACK!!

In my opinion USDA should have started a consumer action educational program designed to educate the consumer that all they  have to do to protect their families from any kind of bacteria is to cook the meat to its proper internal temperature. Instead they have applied a tremendous economic burden not only to the supermarket industry but to the beef packing  industry as well.

If a shopper buys a dozen of eggs and eat them raw and gets salmonella poisoning is the supermarket liable for that?

If a shopper buys a pound of lean ground beef and makes the traditional dish called Steak tartare, and someone gets sick and dies. Is the supermarket liable for that?

If a shopper buys fresh rhubarb and eats the leaves and they will get very sick is the supermarket liable for that?

There are many more examples of foods sold in supermarkets that can make you very sick if not kill you but USDA has no interest in documentation. Why?

 

 

 

 

-- Edited by Coalcracker on Wednesday 10th of February 2016 10:55:37 PM

fdarn wrote:

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Coalcracker wrote:

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There are many more examples of foods sold in supermarkets that can make you very sick if not kill you but USDA has no interest in documentation. Why?

 -- Edited by Coalcracker on Wednesday 10th of February 2016 10:55:37 PM

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Because their agenda is to cripple the retail meat department and force stores to go to case ready meat, which will give their friends in the meat packing industry as huge boost in business.   

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 I dis agree. I may sound like I'm " out there" but I think peta and other animal rights organizations have a lot to do with it through media access coupled by pressure on the usda to come up with a solution. Have any of you out there been on the receiving end of an animal rights organization ?  The animal rights organizations goal is to cripple the meat industry

I tell you what... If you'd have told me 10 years ago that I'd be spending this much time on a computer, scan gun and clipboard, I'd have said you're nuts. And if we're perfectly honest, it's time that goes straight into a black hole. Nobody ever looks at this stuff. It's just there to cover the corporate butt in the case of a zombie apocalypse... Tell me why central processing ground beef in a facility three states away and gas-packing it for week to ten days is safer than the lug under my block.

I just look around for a shred of common sense in this business these days and I just don't get it. Not sure I have another ten years left in me or not.

Leon is right. Sometimes the simplest answer is the right one. Making sense isn't part of their job description.

I just feel like as a society we're sacrificing quality for safety. Something about the gas-pack process just leeches all the flavor out of the meat. I'll become a vegetarian before I eat that ****.

HERE WE GO AGAIN----PUSH MORE AND MORE RESPONSIBILITES FOR GROUND BEEF SAFETY BACK TO THE STORES.

When will supermarkets top brass step up to the plate and fight back before grinding fresh in store will go by the way side. If I owned a sizeable market today and after reading the latest regurgitation  of more and more technical support to fight bacteria at store level form both the private sector or the USDA; I would switch to pre-ground products and never, ever, grind another piece of meat in my store again. I would never use MAP, but I would use pre-package chubs.

My marketing plan to my customers would be simple: Mam, this ground beef comes straight from the meat plant, and no human hands ever touched it. Just like that gallon of milk in your shopping cart. The milk flows from the cow into the jug. LOL>  Why should I at store level have culpability?? And if you want to know why, then all you have to do is read FSIS-USDA rules!!!

These are published facts by the agency my dear friends:

Why is ground beef produced in a USDA-inspected plant safer than beef ground in a "store" or at home?

Hearing about recalls of ground beef products contaminated with E. coli O157:H7 or Salmonella might cause some consumers to consider grinding beef at home; however, this is not a safer alternative to purchasing ground beef at a retail store. In fact, USDA cautions against grinding beef at home.

In a USDA-inspected plant, trimmed beef destined for grinding is tested for the presence of E. coli. However, primal cuts, such as steaks and roasts, are usually not tested. When "stores" or consumers grind these primal cuts, it's possible that pathogens may be present on the raw beef, and either you nor meat market employees can see, smell, or taste dangerous bacteria.

In addition, USDA-inspected plants have Sanitation Standard Operating Procedures that cover policies such as the cleaning of grinding machines and the handling and chilling of ground beef. Consumers and stores might not follow such stringent sanitary procedures.

All you have to do is read this to understand that USDA would love to stop all in store processing of ground beef. I have said this once if not a hundred times. You just can't look at total gross profit in your stores any more. You have to know by category what is really making money for you and what isn't. You have to put "the meat & the labor where the money is". There was a time in our industry that ground beef was a huge profit producing commodity. Unfortunately today with the additional labor, record keeping, and new fangled technical programs plus new labeling, companies are pouring more and more money into maintaining the new and never ending "forced standards". Thus the gross profit on ground beef is diminishing.

Actually you can refer to the law of diminishing returns. Simply put; if all factors stay the same like selling price, profits or pounds out the door, and cost to produce steadily increases then you reach a point of diminishing returns. This is just simple economics.

Actually re-grinding of ground beef in stores today is becoming a liability. They have taken the fun and the pride away from producing ground beef products that we have bragged on for most of our meat cutting lives.

According to the CDC; E. coli O157:H7, the pathogen most commonly associated with ground beef, causes an estimated 96,000 illnesses, 3,200 hospitalizations and 31 deaths in the U.S. each year, adding up to $405 million in annual healthcare expenses.

NOTE THAT NO DOLLAR FIGURES ARE ASSOCIATED WITH THE CDC INFORMATION BELOW. ONLY GROUND BEEF!!

CDC tracked at least 95 outbreaks of Salmonella from beef between 1973 and 2011, resulting in 3,643 confirmed illnesses and 318 (9 percent) hospitalizations.

CDC says that between 150 to 200 people die each year of food allergies and peanut allergies represents nearly 55% of that figure.

CDC says that Toxoplasma gondii (found in pork and lamb kill over 300 people annually

CDC says that Salmonella kills over 370 people annually chickens also carry this bacteria.

CDC says that Listeria kills over 250 people annually found in meat, dairy products and veggies.

CDc says that Norovirus kills over 140 people annually found in any raw foods including veggies, fruit, water almost anything.

CDC says that Campylobacter kills over 75 people annually found in eating undercook poultry.

I LEAVE YOU WITH THESE QUESTIONS:

IS THE USDA PREJUDICE AGAINST STORE MADE GROUND BEEF?

DOES THE USDA REALIZE THEY ARE AFFECTING COMMERCE DUE TO THEIR PREJUDICES?

IS IT TIME FOR MEAT CUTTERS TO BEGIN TO CONTACT U.S. REPRESENATIVES OR CONGRESSMEN CONCERING THEIR PREJUDICE TO SAVE THEIR JOBS?

IS THE USDA TRYING TO IMPOSE THE FEDERAL MEAT PACKING ACT OF 1906, 1957 AND 1970  ON TO  NON-ESTABLISHMENTS SUCH AS SUPERMARKTES?

INSPECTIONS AND LICENSING OF RESTAURANTS AND GROCERY STORES ARE TYPICALLY HANDLED BY LOCAL AND COUNTY HEALTH DEPARTMENTS. IS THIS ABOUT TO CHANGE?

 

 

 

 

Fdarn, there is no doubt that money is fuel that propels politicians to succeed however, votes do as well. All I hear from the members who participates on this site is why, why, and when, when, when. We have to get off "dead center" and let the powers-to-be know that "our jobs, our lively hood, and our families are at stake here. No man, women or powerful organization will retaliate when serious minded and extremely concerned trades people "speak up about their own welfare. It doesn't take Unions to do that. For hundred of years, "we the people" have sparked an era of change in the U.S.A.

As I have said in the past; our trade is fragmented". When I hear members say that "this is the reason I got out", or we should find another line of work, or we should open our own butcher shops, to me this is defeatism.

 Publically we  hear the plight of coal miners,  plight of the migrant workers, plight of domestic workers, plight of minimum wage workers and others I am sure, but who knows about of the plight is of meat cutters?

"Instead of creating polls we should begin to create petitions