What Is Actually in Meat?

Today, we start with the dangerous mycobacteria which causes an immune disease called Sarcoidosis. Here’s our new Senior Research Scientist, Dr. Kristine Dennis.

Sarcoidosis is a disease characterized by granulomas, which are collections of immune cells caused by chronic inflammation that can form in our lungs, lymph nodes, on our skin, and in other parts of our body. The occurrence of sarcoidosis varies greatly around the world, from fairly low levels in countries like South Korea, Taiwan, and Japan to up to a hundred times higher levels in Sweden and Canada.

Race also seems to matter, with Black populations experiencing much higher rates of disease and higher rates of death at younger ages. It is possible Black people may be at greater risk of disease and disease severity, but there are also long-standing systemic health and social inequities that limit access to quality care.

The routine way to treat sarcoidosis is with immune-suppressing corticosteroid drugs to manage the inflammation. Drugs come with their own limitations, though, including steroid resistance, no response to the medications, and a long list of potential side effects. Could nutrition help in sarcoidosis treatment? Possibly. Certain components in food may have anti-inflammatory effects in lung diseases; so, maybe sarcoidosis patients should be encouraged to eat antioxidant and polyphenol-rich diets. But there have yet to be interventional trials to put it to the test.

Are there any steps we can take to potentially avoid this disease? Its cause is unknown. Sarcoidosis can cluster in families, but maybe that’s just because of a shared household environment. Although some gene variants may increase susceptibility, genes alone are insufficient to cause sarcoidosis. Something is driving the disease process. Something is driving the inflammation.

We may be closer to solving one part of the mystery of sarcoidosis. Recent advances in molecular and immunological methods have produced a more rigorous look at the drivers of the disease, indicating that mycobacteria are likely involved in at least a subset of sarcoidosis cases. Mycobacteria like Mycobacterium avium paratuberculosis or MAP is a zoonotic pathogen, meaning it can go from animals to humans. We previously covered the potential link between MAP and other autoimmune conditions, like type 1 diabetes, and how dairy products are a major exposure source in our diets to MAP.

Viable MAP bacteria are still being found in pasteurized milk, despite efforts to extend the pasteurization processes to prevent this. It’s also found in goat milk and various types of cheeses—Swiss, cheddar, sheep, and goat cheeses, along with softer cheeses like mozzarella and burrata. Unfortunately, this is a global issue in countries raising cows in intensive systems, with among the highest rates in the United States, where 68 to 91% of dairy herds are infected.

Two studies looked for MAP bacteria and found none in either sarcoidosis patients or control subjects. Two other studies looked at evidence of MAP exposure, and found between seven and 17 times the odds of reacting to MAP, but neither reached statistical significance. What have we learned since then? In a natural experiment, researchers looked at the rates of sarcoidosis among those who did or did not receive the BCG vaccine, which provides partial protection against mycobacteria like tuberculosis. And those born during a time with high BCG vaccination uptake had lower rates of sarcoidosis. But it’s not like it was a randomized controlled experiment; so, it’s not clear if tuberculosis vaccination could really protect from MAP-associated autoimmune diseases, which also include Crohn’s disease, Hashimoto’s thyroiditis, multiple sclerosis (MS), rheumatoid arthritis, and lupus.

The strongest evidence would come from seeing an effect from treating someone with antimycobacterial drugs. That’s how Barry Marshall got the Nobel Prize for proving that H. pylori caused stomach inflammation: by swallowing some and then curing himself with antibiotics. This is the study that excited the sarcoidosis community. Cardiac sarcoidosis, meaning sarcoidosis of the heart, resolved with MAP antibiotics. MAP was first identified in this patient’s blood, and after more than a year of a MAP antibiotic regime, his sarcoidosis appeared to disappear, something that was never even thought possible. A pilot study in those with pulmonary sarcoidosis also found impressive results with antimycobacterial therapy, with improvements in lung function and quality of life. When the researchers conducted a larger trial, however, there was no significant benefit for lung function despite a significant reduction in mycobacterial immune responses.

So, where does that leave us? Mycobacterium avium paratuberculosis in the food supply is a public health issue. “To reduce human exposure to MAP via consumption of dairy and meat products, quantitative studies are needed for estimating” how much MAP is in the milk, meat, and feces of these animals, and how much fecal contamination is in the milk and meat, to figure out what we need to do to kill it.

Why do we feed a drug to pigs that has a 97.9% likelihood of causing cancer in humans? Our next story is from Dr. Dennis as well.

In the late 1960s, carbadox, a new feed additive which promoted growth in chicks, was also found to promote growth in pigs. It is now fed to more than 40% of young pigs in the United States, not only to increase rate of growth but to control diarrheal disease, too. However, carbadox is also a genotoxic and mutagenic carcinogen in animals.

More than 25 years ago, the European Commission banned the use of carbadox in meat production due to its possible adverse effects on human health. Stating “it is not possible to set a threshold for a genotoxic [DNA-damaging] additive below which” there is no risk to the consumer, since even a small quantity could provoke a tumor-inducing mutation.

Other countries followed. Canada halted its sale more than 20 years ago, and the Food and Agriculture Organization and World Health Organization joint committee on food additives decided there is no acceptable intake amount. So, why is a drug banned in many countries still being fed to pigs in the United States?

Well, one reason is that the drug maker has been defending carbadox, sold under the brand name Mecadox, since the U.S. Food and Drug Administration first proposed rescinding its use based on concerns about the persistence of carcinogenic residues in meat. And, no surprise, the National Pork Producers oppose the FDA’s proposal to ban it––likely because, just as the drug company’s marketing brochure says: “Bottom line, Mecadox can help you market more pork” and make them more money. We’re talking about more than $20 million a year, with sales continuing to increase.

The pork industry claims that removing carbadox would inevitably increase use of other antibiotics and the likelihood of antimicrobial resistance. If it really cared about antibiotic resistance, maybe pork producers would stop feeding millions of pounds of medically important antibiotics to pigs every year in the United States. And carbadox can actually activate dormant viruses that can transfer antibiotic resistant genes among bacteria. This can lead to bacterial whack-a-mole, where using carbadox in pig production may help prevent some bacterial infections but can also lead to the emergence of bacteria that are resistant to antibiotics used in human medicine.

There’s a stalemate at the FDA, as the drug maker keeps battling to continue selling carbadox, and the FDA keeps conceding to its demands. As of November 2023, there seemed to be some hope of the FDA withdrawing carbadox from the market, but we are still waiting on final word. In the meantime, carbadox, with its 97.9% likelihood of causing cancer in humans, is still banned in many countries around the world, and it’s still being fed to pigs bound for the supermarket in the United States.

Finally today, I take on what’s actually in hot dogs and burgers.

What is in the hot dogs we eat? A forensic study published in the Annals of Diagnostic Pathology found bone, blood vessels, nerves, cartilage, and skin. But the kicker was that the amount of actual meat in a hot dog was less than 10%. But of course, the component of hot dogs we should most care about is its cancer risk, and it contributes to colorectal cancer, the #1 cancer killer of nonsmokers.

That’s why the prestigious World Cancer Research Fund and the American Institute for Cancer Research recommended in their landmark report that people simply avoid processed meat. The National Cattlemen’s Beef Association chided the expert report as “bad advice,” saying that a different report found no link between meat and cancer. A report that was, in their words, “comprehensive” by “independent scientists.” “How could the [World Cancer Research Fund] (WCRF) review could come to a different conclusion is perplexing,” the beef association wrote. Well, I found the so-called “independent,” “comprehensive review” the beef industry was referring to, and be perplexed no more!

I was on to it like brown on rice. Let’s compare: the report funded by a leading nonprofit cancer research organization took nine independent teams of about 200 scientists covering nearly 7,000 studies, compiled by some of the top cancer researchers in the world and overseen by the likes of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations and the World Health Organization, producing a report more than 500 pages long.

On the other hand, this one was two-and-a-half pages, written by a for-profit, scientists-for-hire consulting firm, defenders of Big Tobacco and virtually every other toxic substance. And this is a quote-unquote “independent” study? Bought and paid for by the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association.

If you think that took chutzpah, wait until you see what the pork industry did. Smithfield, the largest pork producer in the world, launched the “Deli for the Cure” campaign, donating five cents for every pound sold of exactly the type of meat found most causal for cancer.

What about burgers? Anatomic pathologists at the Cleveland Clinic dissected fast-food burgers to see what was inside. Americans eat five billion burgers a year, and most consumers presume that the hamburgers they eat are composed primarily of meat. But what did the researchers find?

They analyzed burgers from eight different fast-food joints and found them to contain much of the same tissues seen in hot dogs. That’s probably not a good sign. And two of the eight fast-food burgers contained parasites. A quarter of the sample burgers they looked at had swarms of these little parasites. And researchers found blood vessels, nerves, and cartilage too. What about actual meat?

What percentage of a fast-food burger is actually muscle flesh, as opposed to these other tissues, parasites, fillers, and everything else? Meat content in the hamburgers ranged from 2% to 14.8%. Just 2% meat? They’re practically vegetarian!

Part of that other 85 to 98% that was not muscle meat may be ammonia. Thanks to some excellent investigative reporting, we learned that a company developed a novel technique for killing fecal bacteria: injecting beef with ammonia.

The meat industry loved this method so much that ammonia found its way into the majority of hamburgers sold across the United States. The ammonia doesn’t have to be listed as an ingredient because it’s a considered a “processing aid.” In the U.S., it made its way into all the big chains, and millions of pounds every year were given to our kids at school, producing what one microbiologist with the U.S. Department of Agriculture called pink slime, saying he doesn’t even consider the stuff to be meat.

It’s not even good enough for prisoners in Georgia. It was sent back because the meatloaf stank like window cleaner. Why would we feed this to schoolchildren? School lunch officials said they ultimately agreed to use the ammonia-treated meat because it shaved about three cents off the cost of making a pound of ground beef.

The process is banned in Canada. Production and consumption of pink slime is strictly prohibited in Europe. In the United States, however, the meat industry sued ABC News for its story about it, and though ABC News maintained that its reporting was accurate, ABC News backed down after facing the potential for billions of dollars of damages. Upon industry request, the USDA simply reclassified the product as 100% ground beef, displaying the raw power of Big Slime.