The United States began giving antibiotics to poultry in 1946 in order for American farmers to build muscle in their livestock. Researchers discovered that adding small amounts of the antibiotic chlortetracycline to chicken feed could achieve that objective. Over the next decade, researchers experimented and developed a drug mix to optimize animal growth in the shortest time frame possible. This experimentation gave rise to animal factories also known as confined animal feeding operations (CAFOs). These operations are the standard of conventional farming today. Penicillin and tetracycline, two crucial human antibiotics, are common ingredients used in U.S. commercial feeds. Today’s mix of antibiotics make chickens grow so large, so fast, that they often become crippled under their own weight. Additionally, hens are given antibiotics to manipulate egg production. Approximately 13.5 million pounds of antibiotics are used in U.S. animal feed each year.
“More meat for the money” or “more bulk for the buck” is not the only incentive to use antibiotics in American farming. Poultry also receives antibiotics to compensate for crowded, stressful and unsanitary living conditions. Though the antibiotics help protect the poultry, the routine, non-therapeutic use of antibiotics promotes the development of “super bugs”, antibiotic-resistant bacteria. The bacteria can infect humans as well as animals. Antibiotic resistance is an urgent public health problem that costs the U.S. economy billions of dollars each year. The World Health Organization has said it was conceivable that avian influenza could turn into a human epidemic, just as an animal disease is believed to be the possible origin of the deadly Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS).
Additionally, arsenic in chicken flesh has been linked to cancer, dementia, neurological problems, and other ailments in humans. Men’s Health magazine ranked supermarket chicken number one in their list of the “10 Dirtiest Foods” due to the high rate of bacterial contamination.
The US Food and Drug Administration, however, justifies antibiotic use in order to protect the nation’s food supply from dangerous food contamination. Dangerous bacteria include: salmonella, campylobacter, E.coli, T. gondii, and C. parvum. Safety concerns associated with food borne infections gravitate to the most vulnerable population groups: persons with lowered immunity, the elderly, young children, pregnant women, homeless persons, migrant farm works and others of low socioeconomic status.
For more information:
They Eat What - http://www.ucsusa.org/food_and_environment/sustainable_food/they-eat-what.html (Union of Concerned Scientists)
GoVeg.com - http://www.goveg.com/f-top10chickens.asp" (Vegetarian website)
