A new study by the US Department of agriculture found several drugs in meat sold all over the country. The percentage of meat that was contaminated was small, but, when you consider that there’s over 330 million people in the country, the impact can be large.

Here the three drugs they tested for: 

• Ketamine is a medication mainly used for starting and maintaining anesthesia. It induces a trance-like state while providing pain relief, sedation and memory loss.
• Phenylbutazone is anti-inflammatory drug that has been banned for human use by the Food and Drug Administration because of severe side effects, such white blood cell suppression and aplastic anemia.
• Chloramphenicol is a powerful antibiotic only used when safer antibiotics won’t work. It’s used to treat very serious infections such as Cholera and the Plague. Side effects includes serious diseases such as aplastic anemia.

These drugs can get into meat in a variety of ways. For instance, Ketamine is sometimes used to get a sick animal into the slaughterhouse when it’s in too much pain to walk. Animals that are too sick to walk are called downers which are not legal for sale. Other drugs get into the country through illegal means and are put in animal feed to help animals survive filthy and crowded conditions on what’s known as factory farms.

Avoiding unwanted drugs in beef, poultry and pork are yet another reason to follow a plant-based diet.