It's mostly that ground meat (of any kind) is all surface area and surface area is where the bacteria is. With a steak you can eat it rare/raw in the middle because the surface area is just the outside and it gets the heat which kills bacteria. With ground meat there is a fuck ton more surface area, all the way through the patty.

You're right if you grind your own stuff or eat at a place which does it right before cooking, you're much safer. It's not a guarantee though.

I buy my meat a half cow at a time (myself and a friend split one), and you wouldn't believe the amount of ground beef that comes from one animal.

I get what you are getting at - that slaughter houses and butcher shops likely don't separate per animal. But most likely the ground beef you buy is from one maybe two different cows. Which isn't any different than when you buy four filet mignons - there's a chance they may each be from a different animal.

That's not why it's not recommended to eat pink though. When you cook a steak you are cooking the area that has been exposed to bacteria. You can't do that with ground beef because all of it has been exposed to bacteria.

While true, it requires proper food safety precautions and still bears e coli risk. With beef, the bacteria stay on the surface of the muscle. A steak that is seared outside and rare in the middle has still been sterilized by the searing. That aspect goes away with ground beef, where the former surfaces get all mixed in together. When eating a raw minced beef dish like carpaccio or tartare, the proper prep is to remove and discard the outer surface of the steak before mincing in a clean work area and serving immediately. So, in short, eating a medium hamburger patty holds a fair amount more e coli risk than a rare steak.

Eat raw supermarket beef mince then lad