This website uses cookies to ensure you get the best experience while browsing it. By clicking 'Got It' you're accepting these terms.
Most recent
Trending
Top Videos
The best of EcoWatch, right in your inbox. Sign up for our email newsletter!
A tainted meat scandal is rocking Europe after an undercover reporter revealed workers at a Polish slaughterhouse mistreating and killing sick cows and selling the beef for human consumption.
Nearly three metric tons of suspect meat has reached least a dozen European Union countries, according to EuroNews, including Estonia, Finland, France, Hungary, Lithuania, Portugal, Romania, Spain and Sweden.
Secret footage of an abattoir in Poland's Mazovia region shows cows that are so sick they can't even stand and being dragged into slaughter, as well as workers cutting off signs of illness such as tumors and pressure sores from the carcasses, as the Guardian detailed.
Polish authorities have since shut down the operation. Withdrawals of the meat are also ongoing, Anca Paduraru, European Commission spokeswoman for food safety, told Euronews.
"We are in close contact with the Polish authorities and at the request of the European Commission on the 29th of January the rapid alert system for food and feed has been triggered by Poland and this allowed the tracing and the withdrawal from the market of the concerned meat," she said.
Poland sick cow slaughterhouse: withdrawals of meat exported to EU 'ongoing' www.youtube.com
Polish police have launched a criminal investigation into two companies in response to the undercover report, according to Reuters. The European Commission will also send inspectors to Poland on Monday to assist with the investigation.
Poland produces about 560,000 metric tons of beef a year, with 85 percent of it exported.
The country's chief veterinarian Pawel Niemczuk said that new measures will be implemented at slaughterhouses to prevent another similar situation.
"Video surveillance will be available 24 hours a day, but there should be someone with medical and veterinary knowledge that would (be able to) come and assess if the animals are unloaded in line with regulations," Niemczuk said, as quoted by Reuters.
Poland's Agriculture Minister Jan Krzysztof Ardanowski also called the case an "isolated incident," according to Euractiv.
But Patryk Szczepaniak, the reporter who exposed the story on news channel TVN2, told the Guardian that the practice of slaughtering sick cows and exporting the beef could be much more widespread.
Szczepaniak, who worked undercover at the abattoir for three weeks, said dozens of people have reached out and told him about similar practices in other parts of the country.
"My inbox is full of messages from people who live near slaughterhouses, former employees of slaughterhouses, former law-enforcement and regulatory officials, all claiming that similar things have been happening where they are," he said to the Guardian. "It has been a full-time job just following them all up—more is definitely going to come out about this."
EcoWatch Daily Newsletter
New Jersey Will Be First State to Require Building Permits to Consider the Climate Crisis
New Jersey will be the first state in the U.S. to require builders to take the climate crisis into consideration before seeking permission for a project.
Editor's note: The coronavirus that started in Wuhan has sickened more than 4,000 people and killed at least 100 in China as of Jan. 27, 2020. Thailand and Hong Kong each have reported eight confirmed cases, and five people in the U.S. have been diagnosed with the illness. People are hoping for a vaccine to slow the spread of the disease.
By Nancy Schimelpfening
- Nutrition experts say healthy eating is about making good choices most of the time.
- Treats like cookies can be eaten in moderation.
- Information like total calories, saturated fat, and added sugars can be used to compare which foods are relatively healthier.
- However, it's also important to savor and enjoy what you're eating so you don't feel deprived.
Yes, we know. Cookies aren't considered a "healthy" food by any stretch of the imagination.
When you see an actor in handcuffs, they're usually filming a movie. But when Jane Fonda, Ted Danson, Sally Field, and other celebrities were arrested in Washington, D.C., last fall, the only cameras rolling were from the news media.
Trending
Dungeness Crabs’ Shells Are Dissolving From the Severity of Pacific Ocean Acidification
As the Pacific Ocean becomes more acidic, Dungeness crabs, which live in coastal areas, are seeing their shells eaten away, according to a new study commissioned by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).