EU Committee on the Environment votes against thrombin with false arguments - 03.05.2010
The EU Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety
has voted against allowing the enzyme thrombin.
The Committee indicates that manufacturing with thrombin is a process where "the security of the product can not be guaranteed. "
The reason should be that meat is not salted or heat treated and the smaller pieces together have a larger surface that is more susceptible to bacteria such as salmonella.
Professor of Meat Science at the Department of Food Science, University of Copenhagen rejects the arguments from the Committee:
"One can of course be against the use of thrombin based on a certain perception of what meat really is but the argument from the EU Committee on the Environment is not valid."
"We all know the minced meat and eat it every day as hamburgers and meat sauce. Minced meat has a huge surface and it is not heat treated or salted in the production process, "explains Anders Karlsson.
"If the food industry controls their manufacturing process, and it is clean and approved, so you can not get sick just because thrombin was used in the production, says Professor Anders Karlsson.
You can read more about the decision by the EU Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety on http://www.europarl.europa.eu/meetdocs/2009_2014/documents/envi/re/812/812785/812785en.pdf (see Section P and Q).
Carsten Peter Sørensen, - last update:3 May 2010