Letter: Meat pathogens pose danger

Friday, Oct. 26, 2001 | 9:43 a.m.

The report on meat-borne pathogens in the recent New England Journal of Medicine bears special significance against the background of the current anthrax hysteria. Three independent studies found that up to half of supermarket meat and poultry samples were contaminated with antibiotic-resistant bacteria that each year kill thousands and sicken millions.

All this is in spite of the implementation of the new, highly touted USDA meat inspection program and without the workings of anyone wishing us ill. Now, consider the opportunity that a slaughterhouse provides to a bioterrorist.

U.S. slaughterhouses have a large turnover of undocumented aliens. It would be child's play for a bioterrorist to enter the country legally or otherwise, join the slaughterhouse staff, and slip a powerful pathogen into a vat of ground meat destined for hamburgers or hot dogs (frequently eaten uncooked). The culprit would be long out of the country before the contaminated product reaches supermarket shelves and thousands of his victims begin dying.

Anyone really concerned with anthrax or other forms of bioterrorism would be well advised to lay off meat and poultry for a while.

DEBBIE DILL