Low staffing called threat to meat supply

LOS ANGELES - Sometimes, government inspectors responsible for examining slaughterhouse cattle for mad cow disease and other ills are so short-staffed that they find themselves peering down from catwalks at hundreds of animals at once, looking for such telltale signs as droopy ears, stumbling gait and facial paralysis.

The ranks of inspectors are so thin that slaughterhouse workers often figure out when "surprise" visits are about to take place and make sure they are on their best behavior.

These allegations were raised by former and current U.S. Department of Agriculture inspectors after the biggest beef recall in history - 143 million pounds from a California meatpacker accused of sending lame "downer" cows to slaughter.

The inspectors said in interviews that they feared chronic staff shortages in their ranks were allowing sick cows to get into the nation's food supply, endangering the public. According to the USDA's own figures, the nation's inspector ranks had vacancy rates of 10 percent or more in 2006-07.

"They're not covering all their bases," said Lester Friedlander, a former USDA veterinary inspector at a plant in Wyalusing, Pa. "There's a possibility that something could go through because you don't have the manpower to check everything."

Amanda Eamich, a spokeswoman for the USDA's Food Safety and Inspection Service, acknowledged the department had been struggling to fill vacancies, but she denied the food supply was at risk.

"Every single animal must past antemortem inspection before it's presented for slaughter, so only healthy animals are going to pass," she said. "We do have continuous inspection at slaughter facilities."

Similarly, Janet Riley, a spokeswoman for the American Meat Institute, defended the heavily regulated meatpacking industry's safety record. "Nobody has this level of inspection," she said.

The current and former inspectors and other industry critics alleged that the staff shortages were also resulting in the mistreatment of animals on the way to slaughter and may have contributed to this week's recall.

The USDA recalled the beef after the Humane Society of the United States released undercover video that showed slaughterhouse workers at the Chino-based Westland/Hallmark Meat Co. kicking and shoving sick and crippled cows and forcing them to stand with electric prods, forklifts and water hoses.

Wayne Pacelle, the Humane Society's president and chief executive, said that the video was recorded over six weeks in the fall and that all the abuse happened when USDA inspectors were not present.

"The inspection system obviously has enormous gaps if these routine abuses could happen," he said. "The inspector would show up, and if there were downed animals, the workers would try to get them up before the inspectors got there."

Generally, downer cows - those too sickly to stand, even with coaxing - are banned from the food supply by federal regulations. Downer cows carry a higher risk of mad cow disease. And because sickly animals typically wallow in feces and have weakened immune systems, downer cows are more likely to carry E. coli and salmonella, too.

Industry critics say the staff shortages are compounded by a change in USDA regulations in the late 1990s that gave slaughterhouses more responsibility for devising their own safety checklists and for reporting downer cows to the USDA when inspectors are not present.

"The fox is guarding its own henhouse," said Stan Painter, chairman for the National Joint Council of Food Inspection Locals, which represents 6,000 inspectors.