Hello ! I am currently a fourth year Social Psychology major. I am original from L.A, but was born in Michoacán, Mexico. I come from a family that absolutly loves to make food. Just to say, I have a mom who is anti-fast food resturants and will prefer to make a home cooked meal from the two ingredient she might have left in fridge. Back in my homelands my auntie owns a bakery and, occasionally caters for people in the pueblo. I on the other hand don't cook much, but absolutly love to try new foods. I am open for food from all over the world, especailly when the restuarnts I visit have very aesthetic views that I can photograph. 

By: Citlaly Magana

Word Count: 2,638

Red meats are consumed daily worldwide. In 2018, the United States was among the highest meat consumers, consuming 219 lbs yearly per capita. (Figure 1) Red meats are in high demand in America as many people conthem daily. Whether we consume these red meats through a home-cooked meal or at a restaurant, many of us don’t question the making or processing of these meats. At a meat market, we trust the meat wholesalers and market sellers to have the meat already clean and ready for us to get home and cook. At restaurants, we trust owners to have purchased the meats we eat and cook them correctly to be served. In reality, for such a high demand for red meats in a country like this, meat-selling companies must process and produce meat at a very high speed for these stores and companies. At that speed of needing to satisfy buyers and consumers, these meat wholesalers prioritize producing and selling without questioning their processing and handling of the meats. In this essay, I argue that the process and handling of red meats in the United States to keep up with high demand holds an adverse health risk factor in the long run for the human body. I seek to unravel many of the dangers processed meat can bring to our bodies without pushing the complete elimination of red meat. This essay isn’t advocating for one to go vegan, vegetarian, or pescatarian; on the contrary, it is meant to get consumers to think of healthier alternatives when consuming red meat, avoiding the highly processed ones and turning to fresh meat. 

Processed meat is defined as meat preserved by smoking, curing or salting, or addition of chemical preservatives." (Reinagel, 2016) Any alteration to red meat can be defined as processed meat. For this essay, when referring to processed meat, I am referring to meat before it's cooked, the way it is handled before it hits market shelves. To unravel the health dangers that underlie this process of meat. 

Meat processing has been around for centuries; back in the days before the fridge, humans had to develop ways to keep meat stored to transport it across seas for long distances. In "Industrial Food: Towards the Development of a World Cuisine," the journal talks about the way, during the industrial era, salting meats to preserve for transportation was highly used. (Goody, 2018) This salting method for preservation is still used in today's meat preservation. The livestock already holds a percentage of sodium in their bodies, then extra salts are added for processing purposes; while it is being cooked, people tend to add more salt. When we consume that processed meat, it is incredibly high in salt, which is dangerous for your body. As mentioned by Dr.Hu in the New York Times, "Excess sodium intake can increase the risk of high blood pressure and cardiovascular disease." (Egan, 2022) These are among some of the dangerous health issues that many Americans face. Take, for example, Figure 2, with the meta-analysis by Wolk(2016), which reflected that processed meat has a higher relative risk of diabetes and cardiovascular disease(CVDs). As provided by the CDC, as of 2020, cardiovascular diseases accounted for 697,000 deaths in the United States; that is 1 in every five deaths being caused by cardiovascular diseases. Is the danger of processed meat becoming more visible? This essay does not directly associate diabetes and cardiovascular disease with processed meats. However, it emphasizes processed meats' role in the long run in developing these diseases. 

As mentioned throughout the essay, I also want to bring to awareness the handling and processing of processed meat before it hits the market shelf or your plate at a restaurant. Besides ingredients used/added for meat preservation, handling the livestock body holds health dangers for us as well. Chapter 9 of Fast Food Nation discusses how the meat packing companies for fast food burger industries lead to an outbreak of E. coil. This outbreak had much to do with the meat packaging conditions within these facilities. (Schlosser, 2007) Schlosser discusses how this food contamination could have happened during the processing portion of the meat. These places are called slaughterhouses, where there are more than ten people on two sides of a table ripping out to separate certain parts of the cow to be disturbed to different locations.

Figure 1 shows how the United States is one of the highest meat consumption countries. As of 2017, America was processing 26.3 billion pounds of beef and 25.6 billion pounds of pork. (North America Meat Institution) With such a high population in America, the demand for meat seems very high. It is pushing America to produce meat at high speed to meet American needs. This then becomes a money-focused business in which faster and cheaper methods for consumption become more important than the health of Americans. It is essential to disclose that America only sometimes grows/produces its meats; South America and Canada are America's top meat supply producers. 

For example, consider sausage production in the United States. The traditional American breakfast plate— which includes eggs, pancakes, hash browns, and a choice of protein—in almost every breakfast restaurant in the United States includes sausage, ham, or bacon—three very popular processed meats. Making sausage a high-demand type of meat option for Americans, but how many people look into the dangers of sausage? I am a guilty victim of sausage; it is the one thing I look forward to on my breakfast plates. Figure 4 displays the vacuum machine in which different types of red meats are blended with salt and other ingredients depending on the type of sausage for flavor. Alternatively, at least when you search for the making of sausage, the vacuum machine is one of the main things you see. Unraveling information about sausage making, I discovered that even before the meat is thrown into the machine, it is injected with nitrates and nitrites, a chemical used among many processed meats, including ham, bacon, and sausage, that help preserve the meat and adds coloring and salty flavor to it. As of 1980, scientists have discovered an association between sodium nitrates and cancer. (Shakil et al., 2022) If you pick up ham or sausage, many labels state "No Nitrate." However, many of us only look at the meat and never question what the "NO" parts of the label really state. Even with the United States being part of this debate in the 1980s, they still had high production of processed meats. Much of this can be connected with discrediting scientists' findings; meat industries are aware that with the knowledge of this information, the consumption of processed meats goes down, leading to a drop in money. 

The need to hide the truth of how meats are processed and handled circles back to the slaughterhouses talk. When we see ads or commercials on meat processing, we never see the reality of how these animals are handled because it is easier if meat industries paint pretty pictures to avoid the drop in consumption if we know the truth. As the essay mentions, slaughterhouses hold many unsanitary risks while processing meat. It is essential to note that not only is the animal being taken apart by humans and being cut by them, but the meat is also going through many different types of machines assigned different jobs. Just analyze that; your steak goes through about ten procedures before placing it on the market shelf. So many risks come to mind when imagining and watching these processes occur. 

That does not even account for how these animals are handled before being killed. Before being killed, what the animal is given matters in the long run in the effects it leaves behind in the human body. For example, farmers who grow and sell their cattle must feed and grow the cow fat fast enough to sell to slaughterhouses. This might push for using antibiotics in cattle to speed up growth production. Figure 5 represents a bar chart of antibiotic usage in the United States as of 2010, in. comparison to Kenya. The usage in the United States is about 54.1 mg/PSU higher. Luckily for us, using antibiotics for growth purposes is no longer allowed amongst farmers. Here is the twist. It is allowed to cure any issues or diseases the cattle develop. Cattle are fed a high-calorie diet containing much grain, which can lead to the cattle developing abscesses on the liver— which does not kill the cattle but does slow down its growth and can cause complications in the slaughter of the animal. (Charles, 2019) In order to avoid this, farmers rely on an antibiotic known as Tylosin, as it does reduce the number of cattle that develop this issue. (Charles, 2019) Although it helps cattle, it can be an antibiotic that is dangerous to the human body. The antibiotic Tylosin is very similar to erythromycin—an antibiotic that is prescribed to humans. According to Lace Prince, a director of the Antibiotic Resistant Action Center, giving cattle Tylosin can build up antibiotic resistance bacteria. (Charles, 2019) If humans were to become infected by these soon-developing antibiotic-resistant bacteria, there would be no treatment, as the infection would also be erythromycin resistant. Farmers could avoid the usage of this antibiotic by changing up the diet of cattle to avoid liver abscesses. However, it will slow down the growth speed by a month. We might think that it is okay if it means fewer health risk issues for us, but it means the slow down of production causing an increase in cattle price to them.

Fresh or unprocessed meat is the alternative to moving towards healthier red meat eating habits. As reflected in Figure 2, unprocessed meat does still hold health risks but at a lower level. Knowing what the livestock is being fed and having access to getting the meat delivered right after it is killed can significantly impact your health benefits. In other countries that practice growing their livestock to consume it, it has allowed them to live a healthy life. For example, the Rautes hunt for their meat, and although they hunt monkeys and still have old-fashioned methods, they tend to eat their meat raw. (Fortier, 2012) Rautes eat freshly hunted meat; they do not clean it and eat every part of the monkey without having high health risks. This form of meat consumption is essential to their diet; they even migrate to locations where monkeys are found after killing the ones in their areas. 

We can also look at the Maasai tribe from Kenya, which consumes an animal more similar to most of us--- cattle. The Maasai depend heavily on their cattle for eating and necessities for living.(Scientific Inquirer, 2022) They are on a diet mainly consisting of blood, milk, and meat from the cattle. Then yet, they have all of the nutrients that they need and are maintaining a healthy life. This tribe can thrive on this diet because their currency depends on the cattle they raise, meaning they are the ones who feed and grow their castles. They do not depend on bigger industries to handle and process their meats. By this, they prevent their meats from being processed and can consume freshly hunted meat. This could explain why, in 2010, the usage of antibiotics in Kenya was less than that of the United States. (Figure 5) This reflects how we can move towards eating fresh meat to have healthier eating habits.