Slaughterhouse: The Shocking Story of Greed, Neglect, and Inhumane Treatment Inside the U.S. Meat Industry

What started out with a single complaint about a Florida slaughterhouse turned into a tale of intrigue and suspense as investigator Gail A. Eisnitz unearthed more startling information about the meat and poultry Americans consume. This shocking story follows Eisnitz as she becomes submerged in a slaughterhouse subculture, venturing deeper and deeper into the lives of the workers. As the stakes become higher in her David-and-Goliath-type battle, this determined young woman finds herself courageously taking on one of America's most powerful industries. Slaughterhouse takes readers on a frightening but true journey from one slaughterhouse to another throughout the country. Along the way, we encounter example after example of mistreated animals, intolerable working conditions, lax standards, the slow, painful deaths of children killed as a result of eating contaminated meat, the author's battle with the major television networks, and a dangerously corrupt federal agency that chooses to do nothing rather than risk the wrath of agribusiness, before the whole affair is blown wide open in this powerful exposé.

In the last 15 years, thousands of America's small to mid-sized slaughterhouses have been displaced by a few large, high-speed operations, each with the capacity to kill more than a million animals a year. With fewer slaughterhouses killing an ever-growing number of animals, slaughter "line speeds" have accelerated and a production mentality has emerged in which the rapid slaughter line never seems to stop for anything—not for injured workers, not for contaminated meat, and, least of all, not for slow or disabled animals.

While investigating the slaughter industry, Eisnitz gains the trust of dozens of workers across the United States. Without exception, the individuals interviewed admit to deliberately beating, strangling, boiling, or dismembering animals alive in violation of the federal Humane Slaughter Act or failing to report those who did—all in an effort to "keep the production line running." Many also discuss the web of violence in which they have become ensnared and the alcoholism and physical abuse that plague their personal lives.

In an effort to understand how such rampant violations could occur right under the noses of United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) inspectors—the individuals charged with enforcing humane regulations in slaughterhouses—Eisnitz examines the inspectors' track record for enforcing meat and poultry safety regulations, their primary responsibility. Following a long paper trail, she learns that contaminated meat and poultry are pouring out of federally inspected slaughterhouses and, not surprisingly, deaths from foodborne illness have quadrupled in the United States in the last 15 years.

Determined to tell the whole story, Eisnitz then examines the physical price paid by employees working in one of America's most dangerous industries. In addition to suffering disfiguring injuries and crippling repetitive-motion disorders, employees describe tyrannical working conditions in which grievances are met with severe reprisals or dismissals.

Upton Sinclair's The Jungle held the nation spellbound nearly a century ago; Slaughterhouse is about the effects that the changes in the meat-packing industry over the last 15 years—particularly industry consolidation, increased line speeds, and deregulation—have had on workers, animals and consumers. It is also the first time ever that workers—in this case, individuals who have spent a combined total of more than 2 million hours on the kill floor—have spoken publicly about what's really taking place behind the closed doors of America's slaughterhouses.

Read excerpts from Slaughterhouse.