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Pastured cattle are cleaner, giving us safer meat

E. coli contamination takes place in the slaughterhouse when manure from an animal comes in contact with meat. The less manure on an animal when it enters the slaughter house, the less likely the meat will become contaminated.

Even the meat-packing industry acknowledges how difficult it is to remove fecal contamination from feedlot cattle when they stand all day long in dirt and manure. In a recent article in the magazine Meat Marketing and Technology, the associate editor stated that pasture-raised animals were much easier to clean "because they come from small herds raised in relatively clean pastures." Most US cattle, he said, "are raised in far larger numbers in congested and typically less sanitary feed lots."

From an article titled, "The Future of Food Safety," by Joshua Lipsky. Meat Marketing and Technology, April 2001.

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