Eat Meat? Fitness Nutrition Tip…Know the Facts!

Fitness Nutrition big question…is meat even safe?

potentially lethal germs hiding out in the local grocer’s meat aisle

While many reach for hand sanitizer, news reports of microorganisms or  super-bugs are found on your gym equipment, doorknobs, restroom, and remote controls. The germs you really need to worry about to avoid are potentially lethal ones hiding out in the local grocer’s meat aisle.

So is meat even safe? Below is a list of some eye opening  meat industry facts to be sure to make you think:

Antibiotic Abuse

Fact: In North America over 30 million pounds of antibiotics a year are given to animals raised for food. Typical supermarket meat comes from facilities that regularly feed low doses of antibiotics. This continuation of drug contact strengthens bacteria’s resistance to the meds, creating dangerous, yet powerful strains of super bugs.

Fitness Nutrition Lifestyle Tip 1

Plan some meatless meals to cook that include purchasing organic dried beans or vegetarian protein sources. When you do eat meat, be sure to practice proper food-safety measures, no matter how the meat was produced.

Drugs in Meat

USA FACT:  80% of all antibiotics is fed to non-organic livestock to help accelerate growth and help them adjust to stressful, confined and yet filthy housing situations that attacks the animals’ immune systems. The lack of control/accountability for the medication in industrial farming is alarming. Today anyone without medical authority can walk into a livestock feed store and buy an unlimited amount of antibiotics. A proposed legislation in US Congress, known as the Preservation of Antibiotics for Medical Treatment Act, or PAMTA,  could end this dangerous careless drug feeding technique to healthy livery, and uniquely use the medication for when the animal is actually acutely ill and in need.

Fitness Nutrition Lifestyle Tip 2

Look for the organic seal that ensures us that the animals were raised free from antibiotics or growth hormones. To be noted: Humane Certification &  Animal Welfare Approved programs only allow administered antibiotics when animals are taken ill.

MRSA Ladened Meat

Fact: Did you know that MRSA kills more people than AIDS? 2011 research found in the journal Clinical Infectious Diseases stated that 50% of American supermarket meat sampled contained staph infection bacteria and the near lethal MRSA. Turkey is number one to harbor the most staph bacteria with pork following in second place and chicken products in third.

Fitness Nutrition Lifestyle Tip 3

Most contamination occurs at large processing plants. Try to locate local farmers that have med free meat processed in small batches in your area or by visiting the link here:   https://www.localharvest.org/

Prozac

Fact: In 2012, Johns Hopkins University study tested the plumage of the imported chickens to examine what the birds ingested before slaughter. The results found banned antibiotics, painkillers, caffeine, a common growth accelerator,  allergy medication and prozac. According to scientists, antidepressants are used to offset common in factory farm condition anxiety. This stress slows the birds’ growth, thus hurting profits.

Fitness Nutrition Lifestyle Tip 4

Beware of claims like “natural” and logos that depict happy animal farm scenes. Look for legit labels include organic, a certification program considered the most stringent certification in terms of animal well-being  by visiting the link here:   https://www.localharvest.org/

De-worming Medication

Fact: You may be consuming animal worming medication and others including:

    •    Flunixin, a veterinary medication known to cause kidney damage, guttural bleeding, ulcers, as well as black stool in humans.
•    Ivermectin, a powerful animal Wormer that is known for neurological damage in humans.
•    Penicillin, a common human antibiotic, but for those who are allergic, can cause life-threatening reactions
•    Arsenic, a carcinogen fed to poultry, and their feces, are sometimes fed to feedlot cattle. The majority of basic supermarket / fast food beef in this country usually comes from similar feedlot operations.
•    Copper, toxic when our body accumulates it.

Fitness Nutrition Lifestyle Tip 5

Buy organic in the store, find a local farmer you trust, and inspect conditions, and ask questions about how they prevent livestock diseases.

E.Coli

Fact: Some beef is more likely to carry deadly E. coli germs. Cattle are designed to eat grass, not high energy grains. Cattle today are raised in feedlots, where grain is fed to speed growth. Grain also changes the natural chemistry in their gut, making it an ideal environment for E. coli O157:H7 strain to grow.

Fitness Nutrition Lifestyle Tip 6

Look for Grass-fed beef  & Animal Welfare Approved beef that requires that cattle be on pasture diets.

Infections

Fact: Factory supermarket chicken are known to cause urinary tract infections. Researchers found that in 71% E. coli cases from women with UTIs matched the strain found in supermarket chicken.

Fitness Nutrition Lifestyle Tip 7

Go find a local farmer who has pasture raised organic poultry. Research found that birds raised on organic poultry farms had almost 75% less levels of drug-resistant bacteria in their systems than factory raised birds.

Tenderized Meat Caution

Fact: Modern-day farming practices of antibiotics leads to tough, chewy meat and to the process of mechanically tenderizing high-quality cuts of beef. The process involves driving needles into the steak, which also drives bacteria living on the surface deep into the flesh.

Fitness Nutrition Lifestyle Tip 8

Mechanically tenderized meat is not labeled. Try to locate grass-fed beef or better yet a local farmer who processes their own meat and does not mechanically tenderize through this URL https://www.localharvest.org

Fitness Nutrition Lifestyle Bottom Line Tip

With the World Health Organizations claim that diet accounts for at least 30% of all cancers in Western countries, scientists explore links between diet and cancer. Interestingly, one of the most noticeable of the findings was that people who did not eat meat were much less likely to develop the disease. Vegetarians are considered the lowest at risk for cancer. Now that you know the facts, you may want to reconsider your protein choice.

Appleby P, McPherson K. Thorogood M, Mann J,  Risk of death from cancer and ischaemic heart disease in meat and non-meat eaters. Br Med J. 1994;308:1667-1670.