How Fascinating!
The FDA has finally determined what meat men--no, not the "Meat Specialist" behind today's meat counter, but what those few remaining of us who know a pork chop from a lamb chop have known for at least 60 years: There's no need to cook today's pork past 145 F.
Actually, 138 F. kills anything you could possibly get from pork but the extra 7 degrees is a good safety margin. I want my pork cooked through, but not dried out. Cooking it to over about 150-55 will pretty much ensure that today's extremely lean pork will be dry and tasteless.
At Costco the other day, my favorite place to buy beef, I noticed the big red warning label on each package of ground beef: "Cook thoroughly to 160 F."
Why is that? What about "Steak Tartar," a Rare Steak or a Med. Rare, Standing Rib Roast? What about a juicy Hamburger, instead of a hockey puck on a Sesame Seed Bun?
Read the label: Product of New Zealand, Peru, Argentina, Canada and the US (or some similar list of 5 countries), Manufactured in the US. "Manufactured"?
Why the big red "warning" label telling you to cook it to 160 F.?
It's because there's a good chance that some of that assembled array of beef trimmings carries the deadliest e-coli strain; the one that doesn't die until it reaches 160 F.
Where does that e-coli bacteria strain come from? It's in the cow's digestive tract, just before it evacuates.
It's been safe to eat Medium Rare pork for almost 100 years in the US; but today's store bought ground beef can kill you or maim you for life if you don't cook it to at least 160 F.
Is that a society turned upside down? Or what?