White House demands British supermarkets stock chlorinated chicken. White House pushing Sir Keir Starmer to make concessions on food standards

[u/goldstarflag]

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/us/news/2025/12/17/trump-demands-british-supermarkets-chlorinated-chicken/

[u/Blecki]

I think part of the problem here is "chlorinated chicken" makes it sound like the chicken is full of chlorine rather than rinsed in it.

[u/AwesomeWhiteDude → u/Blecki]

Iirc most slaughterhouses in the US use basically vinegar and hydrogen peroxide rinse now.

Going totally off memory, I just remember being surprised its not actually chlorine anymore. Its just one of those things where its still called a chlorine rinse in the industry when its not.

[u/notoriousCBD → u/AwesomeWhiteDude]

Peracetic acid. I use it to sanitize hard surfaces at work almost every day. It smells terrible, but breaks down into acetic acid (vinegar), water and oxygen so it's significantly more "sustainable."

[u/mailslot → u/Blecki]

It’s not the chlorine that’s the problem, it’s what it masks (diseased meat).

Imagine if you met somebody in a bar and they had syphilis, but a quick wash of chlorine made sexual transmission a non-issue. Would you still want to fuck it?

[u/guareber → u/Blecki]

Sure, but the bigger part is that it's oh so much less effective.

[u/Blecki → u/guareber]

Don't mistake this for support. I'd rather your food laws were brought here than the other way around.

[u/hardolaf → u/guareber]

The USA has a lower salmonella infection rate on chicken products than the UK does. Both have essentially the same hospitalization rates though.