Fraudulence Risk Strategic Assessment of Processed Meat Products

Abstract

 A total of 450 samples of different meat products (luncheon chicken, luncheon meat, sausage, beef burger, minced meat, and kofta) were examined. Fifty samples of each type of product were collected from different supermarkets in Assiut City. All of the samples were analysed by different microscopy techniques (light, fluorescence, histochemical microscopy, and scanning electron microscopy (SEM)) for the detection of meat adulteration. Haematoxylin-eosin (HE) staining was used for general histological examinations. Different histochemical techniques were used to stain paraffinised sections. The adulterated tissues detected were the nuchal ligament, large elastic blood vessels, muscular artery, elastic fibers, lung, cardiac muscle fibers, tendon, spongy bone, bone of immature animals, adipose tissue, cartilage (hyaline and white fibrocartilage), and smooth muscle of visceral organs. SEM detected contamination of the minced meat by bacteria and yeast. Fluorescence microscopy was used as an effective method for the detection of bone and cartilage. Interestingly, the stained acidophilic cytoplasm of skeletal muscle changed to basophilic, and the skeletal muscle was suspected to be diseased. The findings of the present work provide qualitative evaluations of the detection of unauthorised tissues in different meat products using different effective histological techniques.