Hightower Lowdown

The chicken has become the most dangerous animal in the U.S. This humble bird is now subjected to such an inhumane, industrialized processing system that it now commonly comes to your table contaminated with such bacterial killers as salmonella and E. coli.

But less reported is the fact that 40,000 workers will be injured this year as they grapple with the eight billion chickens that zip along the conveyor belts of America's poultry plants.

Investigative journalist Christopher Cook reports in Harper's magazine that in these factories, chickens are not the only victims. Workers called "catchers" go into holding pens that are suffocatingly hot and each uses his or her hands to grab some 8,000 frightened, pecking, clawing birds a day, with many of the catch cutting and urinating on the workers. Another group called "evisc" workers manually eviscerate the chickens, twisting the innards from up to 100 chickens per minute— a job that costs many their fingernails, which are destroyed by the bacteria in the carcasses. Workers called "deboners" stand shoulder to shoulder, slicing with knives and scissors all day—and slashing themselves as their blades slip off the slimy carcasses or as they slip on floors slick with gore.

Cook reports that these workers, who typically are paid only $6.50 an hour, have 16 times the national average of trauma injuries. It's hard to get workers to do these awful jobs, so processors like Tyson and Kentucky Fried are pressuring congress to create a "guest worker" program so impoverished immigrants can be brought in to do their dirty work.