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| Image Credit: Brian Yarvin/Getty Images |
Gerald Zirnstein grinds his own hamburger these days. Why? Because this former United States Department of Agriculture scientist and, now, whistleblower, knows that 70 percent of the ground beef we buy at the supermarket contains something he calls “pink slime.”
“Pink
slime” is beef trimmings. Once only used in dog food and cooking oil, the
trimmings are now sprayed with ammonia so they are safe to eat and added to
most ground beef as a cheaper filler.
It was
Zirnstein who, in an USDA memo, first coined the term “pink slime” and is now
coming forward to say he won’t buy it.
“It’s
economic fraud,” he told ABC News. “It’s not fresh ground beef. … It’s a cheap
substitute being added in.”
Zirnstein
and his fellow USDA scientist, Carl Custer, both warned against using what the
industry calls “lean finely textured beef,” widely known now as “pink slime,”
but their government bosses overruled them.
According
to Custer, the product is not really beef, but “a salvage product … fat that
had been heated at a low temperature and the excess fat spun out.”
The “pink
slime” is made by gathering waste trimmings, simmering them at low heat so the
fat separates easily from the muscle, and spinning the trimmings using a
centrifuge to complete the separation. Next, the mixture is sent through pipes
where it is sprayed with ammonia gas to kill bacteria. The process is completed
by packaging the meat into bricks. Then, it is frozen and shipped to grocery
stores and meat packers, where it is added to most ground beef.
The “pink
slime” does not have to appear on the label because, over objections of its own
scientists, USDA officials with links to the beef industry labeled it meat.
“The under
secretary said, ‘it’s pink, therefore it’s meat,’” Custer told ABC News.
ABC News
has learned the woman who made the decision to OK the mix is a former
undersecretary of agriculture, Joann Smith. It was a call that led to hundred
of millions of dollars for Beef Products Inc., the makers of pink slime.
When Smith
stepped down from the USDA in 1993, BPI’s principal major supplier appointed
her to its board of directors, where she made at least $1.2 million over 17
years.
Smith did
not return ABC News’ calls for comment and BPI said it had nothing to do with
her appointment. The USDA said while her appointment was legal at the time,
under current ethics rules Smith could not have immediately joined the board.
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