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Comment by mrguyorama | Hacker News Reader

What evidence do you have that the FDA representatives that are required to sign off on meat production are not doing their job correctly? How many cases of pork parasites or beef contamination in non-fast food products have there been in the past couple years?

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That there are 15 [1] facilities per FDA employee. Take a look at your buildings security, I highly doubt you have a 1 security guard for 15 of the company's buildings. There is no way the FDA is actually annually inspecting every facility (afaik, they don't claim to either).

> How many cases of pork parasites or beef contamination in non-fast food products have there been in the past couple years?

Why do we get to exclude fast-food? That's what beyond burger is tbh, so if we exclude fast-food then it doesn't matter if beyond burger is contaminated.

[1]: 272,719 [2] / 18,000 [3] [2]: https://www.fda.gov/about-fda/fda-basics/fact-sheet-fda-glan... [3]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Food_and_Drug_Administration

Primarily it was because I view "Chipotle/jack in the box/whoever sickened thirty people" to be a different case, with different acting incentives and systems than "Store brand meat full of parasites". I am claiming that fast food supply chains are distinct enough from consumer oriented supply chains that they cannot reflect on each other.

This is not the case for beyond meat, as it's still a small business that is distinct from fast food companies and serves both companies and consumers.

Am I wrong in this thinking?

Wow you couldn’t be more wrong.

every animal is inspected before and after slaughter and stamped by regulators (USDA not FDA) if meat is not stamped by an inspector it cannot be sold. A meat packing plant cannot operate if an inspector is not on site.

As opposed to your doubts about once a year monitoring, literally everything is inspected or it is illegal to sell (even as dog food).

Perhaps US should use this event to apply the same processes in alt-meat rather than condemn it in favor of killing animals.

"What evidence do you have of" ... issues where someone publishing that evidence would be sent to prison for decades for said publication.

Surely you can see the flaw in this?

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