Orange County Register

Since The Watchdog published details about rendering recently, she lost count of the number of people who said they’d never eat another gummy bear.

Rendered animal products are in all sorts of things we eat and use. The question I’ve heard a lot is:  Is it safe?

Rendering, of course, is the process by which the remains of slaughtered animals are cooked at high temperatures to kill bacteria and other uglies; and then recycled into other stuff.

Much of the material fed into the rendering vats was on the cutting-room floor of slaughterhouses - the remains of cows, pigs and chickens - as well as restaurant scraps. There’s no law stopping euthanized pets from entering the stew.

Some rendering processes separate the stew into light fats, dense fats and solids; the recycle it into lipsticks, lubricants, polishes, waxes, soaps, bone meal, protein meal, and, yes, gummy candies.

Note, however, that the dead animals from Orange County’s animal shelter are not rendered into lipsticks,  candies, etc., the renderer says. They go into crude protein that’s exported to ”large aquacultural operations in the Pacific Rim, where sea creatures, including shellfish, are cultivated.” 

Every day, fewer and fewer renderers are willing to accept euthanized animals, which can present a problem to shelters with thousands of carcasses on their hands, said David Meeker, vice president of scientific services for the National Renderers Association.

“We’ve taken a browbeating from people who don’t like the aesthetics of it,” Meeker said. “But it’s perfectly good protein meal, and with food and feed prices what they are, we shouldn’t be so wasteful as to throw it away.”

Like many of her readers, the Watchdog had a gag reaction to the details of rendering, and the prospect that some farm-raised seafood she may have gobbled had, maybe, gobbled food containing Fluffy and Fido.  But - as an avid recycler - she felt more hypocritical the more she thought about it.

If one believes in recycling, how can one oppose rendering?

SAFETY,

folks said. And so The Watchdog took a spin through some research.

She found UH OH scenarios and GET OVER IT! scenarios.

UH OH

There are, indeed, concerns about the safety of eating some rendered products, like those raised in this article from the Union of Concerned Scientists, and this review in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives.

Some pertinent bits from the Union of Concerned Scientists:

• “The advent of “mad cow” disease (also known as bovine spongiform encephalopathy or BSE) raised international concern about the safety of feeding rendered cattle to cattle. Since the discovery of mad cow disease in the United States, the federal government has taken some action to restrict the parts of cattle that can be fed back to cattle.
• “However, most animals are still allowed to eat meat from their own species. Pig carcasses can be rendered and fed back to pigs, chicken carcasses can be rendered and fed back to chickens, and turkey carcasses can be rendered and fed back to turkeys. Even cattle can still be fed cow blood and some other cow parts.
• “Under current law, pigs, chickens, and turkeys that have been fed rendered cattle can be rendered and fed back to cattle-a loophole that may allow mad cow agents to infect healthy cattle.
• “Animal feed legally can contain rendered road kill, dead horses, and euthanized cats and dogs. Rendered feathers, hair, skin, hooves, blood, and intestines can also be found in feed, often under catch-all categories like ‘animal protein products.’ “

Gulp. And these bits from Environmental Health Perspectives:

• “While this industrialized system of food-animal production may result in increased production efficiencies, some of the changes in animal feeding practices may result in unintended adverse health consequences for consumers of animal-based food products.
• “Currently, the use of animal feed ingredients, including rendered animal products, animal waste, antibiotics, metals, and fats, could result in higher levels of bacteria, antibioticresistant bacteria, prions, arsenic, and dioxinlike compounds in animals and resulting animal-based food products intended for human consumption. Subsequent human health effects among consumers could include increases in bacterial infections (antibioticresistant and nonresistant) and increases in the risk of developing chronic (often fatal) diseases such as vCJD.”

That, of course, means variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease.

Oy.

We’ll have Part 2 today before lunchtime.  (It will help your diet).

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