Fast Food Nation, a best-seller by investigative reporter Eric Schlosser, has raised questions about how meat packers treat their employees. Schlosser reports that nearly one-quarter of the 150,000 meatpacking workers suffered a job-related injury or illness and that many employers discourage documentation of injuries, falsify data, and rush injured workers back to their jobs to reduce lost workdays. Meatpacking companies as well as other critics of Schlosser’s work denounce the findings as sensational, pointing out that the author fails to mention the industry’s low fatality rate and a steadily improving relationship between employers and workers.
See "Treatment of meatpacking workers in question", Sherwood Ross, USA Today, July 24, 2001