You’ve nailed it! Let’s talk turkey.

One of the earlier ‘revelations’ was when we found that our last-ditch antibiotic against really severe gram positive infections—the glycopeptide vancomycin—was endangered because turkey farmers were putting the related antibiotic avoparcin in feed.

Quite a lot of work has been done on this. The resistance gene is Van-A. The nasty bugs that carry this gene (in particular) are called “vancomycin resistant enterococci” (VRE). Norwegian turkey farmers started adding avoparcin to feed in about 1986, and a few years later researchers found that not only were the turkeys full of VRE, but ordinary people near the turkey farms were colonised too. The practice was banned there in 1995 and the ban was extended to the whole of the EU in 1997; but the bugs stuck around for years,

This is not surprising. In most countries where avoparcin was used, annual human use of glycopeptides for the whole country was a tiny fraction of the many tons used in animal feed. In the Netherlands in 1996, they used 1500 kg of vancomycin for human therapy (a lot more than many other countries) but animal usage of avoparcin at the same time was about 80,000 kilograms!

This is not an isolated example. About 70% of pig diets contain antibiotics; in the USA in 2010, antibiotic usage in animal feed totalled 13,000 tons

In Europe, the use of antibiotics for growth promotion in animals was banned in 2006.

In the USA every year humans suffer from about 2 million infections with resistant organisms, and of these about 23,000 people die. Multiple bills trying to limit antibiotic usage over the past couple of decades have also died in the USA over the past two decades.

Hope this helps, Jo.

Images from here, here and here.

Footnotes

Major problem is “political”. The “Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations” (CAFO) are effectively “industrial level” enterprises. Operating in rural areas with relatively small populations, they hold considerable power in state governments. Enough that they can get their “owned” state representatives to stop any environmental laws that might “interfere” with their very profitable organizations. Antibiotics in the feed allow crowding animals together and also alter intestinal bacteria to cause weight gain. Growth hormones mean the animal grows faster and steroids increase appetite which means the animal eats more and gets fat. Remember the animals are sold by weight so getting them big and fat ASAP is “money in the bank”.

Needless to say, these operations produce a lot of “waste” (animal shit and piss) and the drugs given them end up in the “waste”. Leakage into the environment is a major problem. You get pollution in the local water ( brooks and rivers) and perhaps maybe in the more shallow wells. Yes, all this makes for “cheaper meat” (perhaps more tender too), but long term health effects? What evidence there is indicates we are slowly poisoning ourselves and damaging our long term health.

If you have access to a good public library system, you can learn much more. Unfortunately, our current administration is very unlikely to do anything about it…

In many large commercial operations, medicated feed is a critical necessity given the conditions the chickens are living in. It’s very easy for them to pass diseases to one another in battery cages and grow-out sheds because they are stressed and crowded, and their population amounts into the hundreds of individuals.

In my case I run a very small operation with free-range pastured birds that are allowed to explore and carry out their natural instincts freely, so I don’t need to give them medicated feed. I can manage their health through good husbandry and quarantine so I do not introduce diseases into my flock. I use good quality unmedicated feed, and the only time I give my birds antibiotics is if they actually get sick and require it.

Short answer, No.

Longer answer. They only are curtailed when there is a harsh and very bright spot light of publicity shown on the the subject. And, people yell about it. A lot, loudly. And vote with their pocketbooks.

Organic, small producers, like me, do not use antibiotics. It’s relatively easy for me not to. My hens are free ranging, well fed, unstressed and given lots of extra food sources that keep them healthy and strong. Hens kept in cages, force fed what amounts to garbage for food, (animal waste products mixed with some cheap corn) filthy, crowded together in dark rooms where the only air is forced in with a blower, if they are lucky. Because of this, these hens are stressed out and barely surviving. They are susceptible to any virus or biological illness that blows through or is brought in on the crap they pretend is food. So, they either use antibiotics or the birds soon die of the first illness that comes along.

Now you ask, wasn’t that spot light shown on them a while back? Don’t regulators now keep careful watch?

Hmm Hey I have a question for you? Wanna invest in some ocean front property in Sunny Arizona?

Google “Ag Gag laws”.

What’s going on with U.S. “Ag Gag” laws?

The Ag Gag Laws: Hiding Factory Farm Abuses From Public Scrutiny

Six states have ag-gag laws on the books: Alabama,Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri and North Carolina. Guess where a lot of US meat and eggs come from?

Want it in graphic format? https://ccrjustice.org/sites/default/files/attach/2017/09/Ag-GagAcrossAmerica.pdf

In June of this year Federal Courts allowed the Ag Gag law in North Carolina to proceed. And the beat goes on.

I’d also so say, with Trump so vocal and active against so many consumer protection regulations, in preference to business as used to be, I suspect things will get a lot worse before they even wave at getting better.

They’re not necessarily “bad” for chickens. The problem is overuse and using them incorrectly which makes antibiotics less effective for the entire world. So many people on the internet will say things like “Oh, it looks like you’ve got xxxx. Give them a bunch of Tylan 50 and they’ll be fine in 5 days.”

Maybe they will be fine. But did you give them enough Tylan each day? Or for enough days? The old wisdom used to be “give them just enough to get better” but that’s not how doctors should prescribe antibiotics now.

There’s also the problem of ‘sub theraputic” antibiotics. Antibiotics have this interesting property of causing animals to gain weight. It’s been standard practice on some farms to crowd animals so much that they get sick that they just get a constant flow of antibiotics in their food or water. This keeps sickness down and has the side effect of causing them to gain weight faster.

To a large degree “antibiotics” are a proxy argument for factory farming.

The antibiotic in the chick starters helps keep them from getting sick They are only a day or 2 when I get them and they haven't a mama to show them how to peck and learn healthy chicken ways. So for me, it is a little insurance. When the chicks are feathered out, they go to the hen house and eat chicken grower or egg layer ration. They are not free range chickens but they have a nice yard fairly safe from predators. They get bugs that fly by, we catch grasshoppers to hand feed, and give them weeds to make their eggs prettier and tastier

I hope I have answered some of your question I threw in some homestead chicken ways

If you were talking abt a commercial chickens, the reason for the antibiotics is partly the same, help keeping them health and it helps their feed conversion.

I like to see fewer antibiotics in raising lives, for our nourishment. They do have a place, but it must be used following the guidelines.

Your “basis and facts” for this question is on faulty ground. Those farm animals only get antibiotics when they are prescribed to them by a licensed veterinarian that has a current Veterinarian - Patient - Client relationship. The animals must be examined and deemed in need of certain medications / treatments… Any farmer giving their animals illegally obtained, outdated or foreign bought medications is breaking the law on their own.

Visit the FDA, APHIS & USDA and research the guidelines and examine the forms that are required to get medications added to farm animal feeds (Veterianry Feed Directice), changes were put in place in 2012, 2013 they were enacted and 2015 brought about major changes… if you don’t like reading or doing background research… just call a pharmacy, a veterianrian, a feed store and pretend to have farm animals that need drugs and see EXACTLY how you are treated. Those drugs are NOT easy to get. You must actually have sick farm animals and a veterinarian involved.

I feel all antimicrobials, antibiotics and anti-parasitic compounds used in animals should be prescription only - because PARASITE resistance is FAR MORE SERIOUS in the animal world that bacterial resistance… MRSA & MRSP are human nosocomials - all meats sold through the USDA have to be negative for any residues of antibiotics, producers have to follow wothdrawal times and cannot send animals to market or use their meat or milk products until that time has expired - the penalty for risking such a thing is enormous and not worth it for the producers.

So they do not die.

The antibiotic used, cannot harm a human.
Because humans do not use this type of antibiotic.

They do not want to use antibiotics.
Antibiotics cost money.
I have heard, but not confirmed, the chicken meat will not have any sign of antibiotics when it is sold to the public.

When a label says “no antibiotics” it means the animal whose meat you’re about to eat was never given antibiotics.. It was never treated or routinely fed antibiotics.

Antibiotics aren’t just used to cure illness in livestock. Somewhere along the line folks learned that if you feed animals antibiotics, they grow faster. That’s a winning proposition in the meat business.

The problem is that we don’t have barriers between human antibiotics and animal antibiotics, they’re typically the same ones. And constant use breeds germs that no antibiotic can cure.

So now we have a problem. People get sick with certain things and the antibiotics that used to work, no longer do.

There’s also a school of thought that believes that “second hand” antibiotics - those you get without knowing it because you ate the meat of an animal that was given them - wrecks havoc with your own health.

Think about this. Antibiotics kill off the bacteria in your intestine that actually do all of the hard work of digesting your food. “You” don’t do it, the bacteria that live in your gut do. When the bacteria are killed off we get diarrhea and problems digesting/assimilating the nutrients in our food. That’s why people who have recently been on antibiotics are often prescribed probiotics…. to try to put back the good part of what was killed. Now imagine if you’re constantly eating meat with antibiotics in it —- and not just one kind of antibiotic, but different ones from different farms and animal types. You’re constantly killing some part of your gut biome (bacteria) and that’s a recipe for digestive problems. For the most part, when you ingest meat you’re only getting a light dose of the antibiotics, but that takes us full circle back to the first problem.

Remember the old adage - what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger? That is true of bacteria too. So you have some random bacteria in your gut. It’s not a good part of your biome, you just picked it up and it’s there. Your immune system keeps it from getting too common. Meanwhile they’re exposed to low doses of the exact same antiobiotic you’d need to take to kill it from the meat you’re eating, and from that low, non-lethal exposure learns how to thrive and not be killed by it. Boom. You are now harboring an antibiotic-resistant bacteria. So, life happens, your immune system crashes, and you’ve got this opportunistic bacteria hanging out in your body just waiting for it’s chance. It multiplies, you get ill, you go to the doctor, they do a test and identify the bacteria, and the prescribe the usual antibiotic. Only it doesn’t work any more. Now you’re in critical care and the doctors are working round the clock to figure out what WILL kill it - or if anything will.

These are things folks worry about when they ask if their food has been given antibiotics.

Read this article to get the chronological history on this topic:

Shown Here: Introduced in House (03/16/2017)

• Quora required LINK: Text - H.R.1587 - 115th Congress (2017-2018): Preservation of Antibiotics for Medical Treatment Act of 2017 .

115th CONGRESS
1st Session

H. R. 1587 ~ To amend the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act to preserve the effectiveness of medically important antimicrobials used in the treatment of human and animal diseases.

“””” IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES ~ March 16, 2017

Ms. Slaughter (for herself, Ms. DeLauro, Mr. Cicilline, Mr. Connolly, Mr. DeFazio, Mr. Deutch, Mr. Langevin, Mr. Ted Lieu of California, Mr. Lowenthal, Ms. McCollum, Mr. Moulton, Mrs. Napolitano, Ms. Norton, Ms. Speier, Ms. Tsongas, Mr. Yarmuth, Mr. Jeffries, and Ms. Shea-Porter) introduced the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on Energy and Commerce

• A BILL~ To amend the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act to preserve the effectiveness of medically important antimicrobials used in the treatment of human and animal diseases.
• Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,
• SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.
• This Act may be cited as the “Preservation of Antibiotics for Medical Treatment Act of 2017”. , SEC. 2. FINDINGS.
• The Congress finds the following:
• (1) All uses of antibiotics, including for food-producing animals, have the potential to cause resistance and contribute to the development of antibiotic-resistant bacterial infections in people.
• (2) In 1977, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) concluded that feeding livestock low doses of antibiotics used in human disease treatment could promote the development of antibiotic resistance in bacteria. However, the Food and Drug Administration did not act in response to these findings, despite laws requiring the agency to do so.
• (3) In 2012, the Food and Drug Administration Guidance for Industry #209 provided a summary of over 40 years of peer-reviewed scientific literature regarding use of antimicrobial drugs in livestock which reiterated that the use of antibiotics in animals contributes to the resistance in human pathogens and concludes that strategies for controlling antibiotic resistance, including limiting medically important antimicrobial drugs in food-producing animals only to uses that are considered necessary for assuring animal health are needed.
• (4) The 2014 President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology Report to the President on Combating Antibiotic-Resistant Bacteria also concludes that substantial evidence exists that the use of antibiotics in food animals promotes the development and spread of antibiotic resistance in bacteria that can spread to people and that it is clear that agricultural use of antibiotics can affect human health.
• (5) Recently published scientific studies have shown that food-producing animals, and animal production facilities, are a source of antibiotic-resistant bacteria which have infected humans and present an increased risk of acquiring and antibiotics resistant infection.
• (6) Antibiotic resistance is a crisis which threatens public health, the economy, and national security.
• (7) In 2013, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimated that antibiotic-resistant infections cause at least 2 million infections, 23,000 deaths, 8 million additional hospital days, and $20 to $35 billion in excess direct health care costs each year in the United States.
• (8) The 2014 World Health Organization report, “Antimicrobial Resistance: Global Report on Surveillance 2014”, concluded that antimicrobial resistance is a current reality and the problem is so serious that it threatens the achievements of modern medicine.
• (9) Without effective antibiotics—
• (A) common infections could become untreatable—even fatal; and
• (B) medical advances such as joint replacements, Cesarean sections, organ transplants and chemotherapy could become nonviable.
• (10) Antibiotic resistance, resulting in a reduced number of effective antibiotics, may significantly impair the ability of the United States to respond to terrorist attacks involving bacterial infections, such as anthrax and smallpox, or to an event resulting in a large influx of hospitalized patients.
• (11) In 2011, the Food and Drug Administration determined that—
• (A) 13.5 million kilograms of antibacterial drugs were sold for use on food animals in the United States in 2010;
• (B) 3.3 million kilograms of antibacterial drugs were used for human health in 2010; and
• (C) therefore, 80 percent of antibacterial drugs disseminated in the United States in 2010 were sold for use on food animals, rather than being used for human health.
• (12) The “FDA Annual Summary Report on Antimicrobials Sold or Distributed in 2012 for Use in Food-Producing Animals” showed that the use of medically important antibiotics in food-producing animals increased 16 percent from 2009 to 2012.
• (13) (A) In 2003, the Food and Drug Administration modified the drug approval process for antibiotics to recognize the development of resistant bacteria as an important aspect of safety, but most antibiotics currently used in animal production systems for nontherapeutic purposes were approved before the Food and Drug Administration began considering resistance during the drug-approval process.
• (B) The Food and Drug Administration has not established a schedule for reviewing those existing approvals.
• (14) A stated goal of FDA Guidance documents 209 and 213 is a reduction in the overall consumption of antibiotics. The FDA policy continues to allow the use of antibiotics for routine disease prevention without requiring evidence of the presence of a specific disease or requiring the mitigation of conditions which elevate disease risk.
• (15) There is inadequate distinction between usage for disease prevention and production purposes, such as growth promotion, on FDA approved drug labels. A 2014 analysis of the approved animal drugs affected by Guidance 213 by the Pew Charitable Trusts found that numerous approved drug labels contained overlapping indications for growth-promotion and disease prevention.
• (16) The European Union (EU) banned the use of antibiotics for growth promotion in 2006, a full decade before the FDA’s voluntary approach will go into effect.
• (17) Since the EU ban, antibiotic usage has decreased without affecting livestock production.
• (18) In 2010, the Danish Veterinary and Food Administration testified that the Danish ban of the nontherapeutic use of antibiotics in food-animal production resulted in a marked reduction in antimicrobial resistance in multiple bacterial species, including Campylobacter and Enterococci.
• (19) The experience in the Netherlands has shown that during the phaseout use indications for growth promotion were completely supplanted by disease prevention. Total antibiotic consumption remained constant. After the implementation of mandatory reduction targets and improved surveillance of usage practices antibiotic consumption declined ahead of target without impacting production levels.
• (20) In 2009, the Congressional Research Service concluded that without restrictions on the use of antimicrobial drugs in the production of livestock, export markets for livestock and poultry could be negatively impacted due to restrictions on the use of antibiotics in other nations.
• (21) The American Medical Association, the Infectious Disease Society of America, the American Public Health Association, the National Association of County and City Health Officials, and the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition are among the over 400 organizations representing health, consumer, agricultural, environmental, humane, and other interests that have supported enactment of legislation to phaseout nontherapeutic use in farm animals of medically important antimicrobials.
• SEC. 3. PURPOSE.
• The purpose of this Act is to preserve the effectiveness of medically important antimicrobials used in the treatment of human and animal diseases””””, Text - H.R.1587 - 115th Congress (2017-2018): Preservation of Antibiotics for Medical Treatment Act of 2017 .

For much the same reasons they can be bad for us. They can kill off their gut flora, be toxic in large doses, lead to resistant infections, maybe cause some stasis within the …. uhhhh … chicken hindgut part…. Coelom? Or maybe just colon? I forget. The chicken’s poop chute.

The reason it is “bad” to give chickens antibiotics is more to do with human health. If it’s a sick chicken, or a flock of sick chickens, then maybe they do need some antibiotics… And if approached that way… Probably no big deal.

But… For ages, stupid humans have been giving chickens (and lots of other animals) antibiotics as growth promotants, or have been giving antibiotics to them inappropriately (e.g. when they’ve got parasitism or malnutrition, but some doofus has a big bottle of oxytetracycline or enrofloxacin and so that’s what the chicken’s get….)

It is because the situation has another, more powerful light. As a growth supplement, such use increases the profitability of livestock operations. The livestock industry has profited from using antibiotics in this way for many years before anything was known about its link to increases in the populations of antibiotic resistant strains of bacteria.

In the time before this effect was discovered, relationships between livestock interests, drug producers, and politicians developed involving campaign contributions being given to the politicians by the business interests in exchange for the politicians keeping the legal and political environment favorable to the profitability of the industry.

Money for financing campaigns, and money for profit, is of much higher importance to these people than any notions of the emergence of antibiotic resistant bacteria or public safety. The same dynamic is at work creating our situation of planetary warming.

They are caught up in self-centered, short term thinking. Taking care of public health expands economies in the long term, and makes it possible create wealth for a much broader segment of society, but the human tendency to “grab the money now” for “me first” is what leads crises such as this and others to grow into serious civilizational dangers before corrective action is taken.

• Commercially some poultry farms are still allowed to use primarily subtherapeutic quantities of antibiotics because it helps prevent disease and control spread of diseases in crowded farm conditions. The practice remains due to industry try to persued and economic considerations, despite concerns about antibiotic resistance.
• Progress in regulating this practice has been made, particularly with the FDA's 2017 guidelines that phased out the use of medically important antibiotics for preventing diseases and required veterinary practics oversight for their use. However, critics argue that loopholes and enforcement challenges persist, meaning that the practice has not been fully eliminated.

Nearly all types of broad-spectrum antibiotics are given to chickens. Most of them have been tested on humans and are not immediately harmful, BUT:

#1. They will alter you gut flora, which may have long term adverse effects on your health (unclear at present exactly what, but it is not looking good);

#2. They will probably increase the proportion of antibiotic-resistant organisms in your gut, your respiratory system and on your skin. If you then get an infection from one of these, the difficulty of treating it will be much greater;

#3. You are much more likely to infect someone else with an antibiotic-resistant organism.

All these effects on a single individual eating antibiotic-fed chicken are pretty minor - perhaps negligible - but the effect over the whole population, together with the effect of releasing tons of antibiotics into the environment in animal poo, is pretty major. That’s why the era of successful treatment of bacterial diseases with antibiotics may be nearing its end after 90 years or so.

The only time you should even consider giving your chicken and antibiotic is when it is injured or I'll and your vet recommends one. There are natural antibiotic treatments that can keep your flock healthy. Adding about ¼ cup of organic apple vinegar with “the mother" and about a ⅐ teaspoon of oregano to a five gallon waterer is very helpful for fending off intestinal parasites. Also, keep a watering station that has peppermint added to the water for those who have an upset stomachs. I also use diatomaceous earth to dust them and in the nesting boxes to control mites. Other than that, I never give my chickens anything that they wouldn't find in nature. If you have a chicken that you suspect is I'll, isolate her immediately and watch her. If she doesn't pop back within one day, get her to your vet. And make sure to keep an eye on the rest of your flock.

As a veggie and a promoter for vegetarianism I have refrained to eating eggs to chicken to any kind of meat. On certain visits I have tried veganism too. It has been a bliss.
Lets Get back to your problem.

You must have heard of chicken wings. The juicy advertisements created by Mc Donald's and KFC. And have you seen a bird wing. It does not have any muscle which can be considered edible. There are so many ways we feed our chickens with antibiotics, pig meat and fattening grains. Most of the chickens die due to heart diseases and some get enormous tumours.

Antibiotics. Have you ever visited a poultry farm where chickens are bred. Oh the unholy environment where they are bred for human consumption. After the pandemic of Bird Flu 2003. We started caring a bit more for our avionic food’s health. We started feeding them bird grade antibiotics for our health and their lethargy.

Pig Meat. More the meat higher is the profit margins. Not just pigs meat any got damn agent which can fatten my chicken. We have put huge investments so the chicken produces more eggs and more meat. Profit motivates the business as simple as that.

Hooters. To get eggs from chicken on time the poultry farm owners apply various scare tactics. The Industrialization of poultry business has taken a few ugly turns, to get eggs from all the chickens the poultry owners will burst out a Hooter and scare the chicken on laying eggs at the same time. So the outer shell and sometimes the inner yolk of the chicken remains under developed.

There is much more deep underlying cruelty/no benefits to eating egg as proposed by the media.

Sorry for ruining your Breakfast.

It isn't innate in chickens to be "disease prone" it is how they are raised. I think if you compare the health of a small rural town versus the health of a densely packed city you might find the denizens of the city are "disease prone" as well. Now, compare it a small USA city to Baku, Azerbaijan, one of the most polluted and dirties cities in the world, on a health level. I think you'll find a huge difference in citizen health, cancer rate, etc.

What looks more healthy to you:

factory farmed chickens

or this

free range chickens

Because of the factory farmed birds are so crowded they are living in each others defecation. They have no muscle tone as they can't move this also means they can eat less because they don't need the food to power their muscles. If you took them out of their cages they would be unable to walk. They have probably never flown in their lives. Because of they crowded, very unhealthy conditions they must be given antibiotics on a daily basis to keep them alive long enough to make the farming profitable.

We currently only have 8 laying hens but even in winter we're getting about 3 eggs a day. When it warms up we'll average about 7 a day. That's more eggs then we can eat as a family of four. If you're trying to produce 90 billion eggs a year (the current USA poultry production) you can't have 8 backyard chickens with 10 acres to roam unless you spread all those chickens out among a lot of different farmers, and that costs more money then you are willing to pay at the market for a dozen eggs (mine $3 a dozen for free range, organic eggs) that's about $1 more per dozen then super market eggs.

So far, we're touched on egg layers. In 2010 9 billion chickens were slaughtered for food. Again to achieve those numbers they are packed in tight spaces. If you are getting "free range" from a super market you are probably talking about this:

That is considered free range by the USDA. It is certainly better than the tight cages but disease is still a huge problem because in nature that many chickens would not be in the same area. They are fed hormones to boost their growth and given antibiotics. They probably do live a little longer than the caged birds.

Think about this, meat chickens used to be killed by CO2 gas or breaking their necks (let's call it what it is) but they have recently added "maceration" as a form of euthanasia for newly born chickens. See this document on avma.org page 41 section M3.10:

Maceration, via use of a specially designed mechanical apparatus having rotating blades or projections, causes immediate fragmentation and death of poultry up to 72 hours old and embryonated eggs. A review406 of the use of commercially available macerators for euthanasia of chicks, poults, and pipped eggs indicates that death by maceration in poultry up to 72 hours old occurs immediately with minimal pain and distress. Maceration is an alternative to the use of CO2 for euthanasia of poultry up to 72 hours old. Maceration is believed to be equivalent to cervical dislocation and cranial compression as to time element, and is considered to be an acceptable means of euthanasia for newly hatched poultry by the Federation of Animal Science Societies,407 Agriculture Canada,408 World Organisation for Animal Health,342 and European Union.4

Just grind them up because they won't feel it anyway, they're less than four days old anyway. Of course, you don't eat those (in the USA so far anyway) but your dog does and that just spreads the disease through all the meat.

The answer is farm naturally in a sustainable way. Let your hens produce the next generation with an occasional rooster swap with your neighbors to keep the genetic pool diverse. Don't try to raise food to feed 1,000 people, raise enough food to feed 100 and let 9 other farmers do the same. But, you consumer, need to be willing to use more of your income to feed yourself and your family healthy food.

Organic chicken is strictly regulated and must adhere to certain standards. This means that it must be raised without the use of antibiotics, both in production and for disease control. As a result, organic chicken cannot contain any antibiotics at all.

In recent years, people are increasingly looking for antibiotic-free chicken due to the growing concern about the use of antibiotics in poultry production.

Society is more aware than ever of the potential risks associated with antibiotic overuse, such as the development of antibiotic-resistant bacteria and other health problems.

In response to this demand, many companies have made commitments to reduce or eliminate their use of antibiotics in poultry production. However, it can be difficult for production processes to truly become antibiotic-free due to the challenges posed by conventional farming methods of raising chickens.

Fortunately, the challenge of producing antibiotic-free chicken can be solved with cultivated chicken, the same as with other antibiotic-free meats.

In this blog post, we will explore the implications of antibiotic use and overuse in poultry production, how companies are responding to consumer demand for antibiotic-free meat, and how cultivated chicken could be the solution.

HOW ARE ANTIBIOTICS USED IN POULTRY PRODUCTION?

Americans eat more chicken than any other meat. But more conscious consumers are starting to ask questions about whether they are eating organic chicken or if the best chicken brands are producing antibiotic-free chicken.

Antibiotics are used to prevent disease, promote growth, and treat infection in chickens. While most chicken meat is labeled as “antibiotic-free”, this does not necessarily mean that no antibiotics were used during production.

If an antibiotic was used on the farm, federal rules require that the antibiotics must have cleared the chicken’s system before it can be sold as antibiotic-free meat. This means that chicken can be labeled as antibiotic-free meat even if there are trace amounts of antibiotics present.

In addition to preventing disease and promoting growth, antibiotics are also used to reduce mortality rates and improve feed efficiency in poultry production. The goal is for antibiotics to help chickens stay healthy and produce more eggs with less feed.

Excessive use of antibiotics, however, can lead to resistance development in bacteria, allowing the bacteria to defeat the drugs that are designed to kill them. This can cause serious health problems for both humans and animals alike.

IS ALL CHICKEN ANTIBIOTIC-FREE?

As we have discussed, the answer to the question "is all chicken antibiotic free?" is not simple. More than a third of consumers frequently buy meat, poultry, and other foods with an “antibiotics-free meat" claim.

But in the United States, the term "antibiotic free" can be used for chicken that has been given antibiotics for growth promotion or chicken that has been given antibiotics to treat disease.

Overuse of antibiotics has been linked to an increase in antibiotic-resistant bacteria among humans, making it difficult to treat certain illnesses with traditional and life-saving treatments.

When antibiotics are used to treat bacterial infections, they can kill the bacteria that are causing the infection, but also some bacteria can develop resistance to antibiotics. This means that the antibiotics will no longer be effective in killing the bacteria.

In addition, the use of antibiotics in poultry production can have negative environmental impacts. The presence of antibiotic residues in soil and water can disrupt natural ecosystems and harm wildlife populations.

At Believer, we are able to easily make cultivated chicken without any antibiotics because of the controlled, laboratory environment we use.

WHAT DOES THE CLAIM “NO ANTIBIOTIC CHICKEN” MEAN?

For consumers looking to eat only antibiotic-free chicken, finding out what is or isn’t truly antibiotic-free meat can be a challenge. It is important for people to understand the difference between antibiotic use policies and claims, so they can make the decision that is right for them.

There are two main policies that ensure chicken being served is truly antibiotic-free: organic chicken and no antibiotics ever. While there is a distinction between organic chicken and no antibiotics ever chicken, both assure the consumer that the animal never came into contact with an antibiotic.

Organic chicken is strictly regulated and must adhere to certain standards. This means that it must be raised without the use of antibiotics, both in production and for disease control. As a result, organic chicken cannot contain any antibiotics at all.

No antibiotics ever (NAE) also means the chickens never came into contact with antibiotics, not even to receive treatment when they are sick. The chickens are raised in a way to prevent them from getting sick in the first place. If a chicken is treated for an illness, it cannot be included in the NAE label.

Some restaurants serve meat that have not been given “medically-important antibiotics,” which are antibiotics that are also given to humans. But the animals still could have been given other antibiotics.

It is true that many conventional farmers do not give their chickens growth promoting antibiotics, but that is still just one, smaller class of antibiotics. With cultivated meat, the need for antibiotics is completely eliminated, because no animals are being farmed or slaughtered.

WHAT ARE THE CHALLENGES OF GROWING TRULY ANTIBIOTIC-FREE CHICKEN?

As consumers become more conscious about the food they eat, the demand for truly antibiotic-free chicken continues to grow. Achieving completely antibiotic-free meat production, though, comes with its fair share of challenges.

1. THE COST OF PRODUCING ANTIBIOTIC-FREE MEAT

Firstly, economic factors pose a challenge in the switch to antibiotic-free production. Antibiotics can help farmers save on feed and labor costs, leading to increased profits.

On the other hand, raising antibiotic-free chicken can require more costly feed and additional labor to ensure the birds remain healthy. This added expense could make it difficult for smaller farms to make the transition. If they can make the transition, it is likely that those costs will be passed down to the consumer.

2. CONTROLLING DISEASE IN ANTIBIOTIC-FREE CHICKEN

Secondly, disease control is essential to raising healthy chickens without antibiotics. Unfortunately, this can be challenging, especially with large-scale poultry operations.

The close quarters and high density of birds make them more susceptible to illness, which can lead to significant losses if left unchecked. Although preventative measures such as vaccines and improved hygiene practices can help, it's not always enough to prevent outbreaks.

3. WHAT IS NECESSARY TO PRODUCE ANTIBIOTIC-FREE CHICKEN?

Lastly, consumer misconceptions also play a role in the challenges faced in growing truly antibiotic-free chicken. There's a common belief that antibiotics are necessary for keeping chickens healthy and preventing illness.

While this may be true to an extent, the overuse of antibiotics can lead to antibiotic-resistant strains of bacteria, which can have serious implications for human health. The challenges of antibiotic use, though, can be completely mitigated with cultivated meat.

WHAT IS THE POULTRY INDUSTRY'S RESPONSE TO ANTIBIOTIC OVERUSE?

In response to the growing concern about overuse, the poultry industry has taken a number of steps to reduce the use of antibiotics in raising chickens.

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has issued guidance for "responsible stewardship practices that include actions to preserve the effectiveness of antibiotics while maintaining animal health." The FDA's guidance is voluntary, but the poultry industry has largely complied with it.

It is true that the best chicken brands are investing in animal welfare practices that can help to reduce the need for antibiotics. These practices include providing chickens with more space to move around, better ventilation, and access to clean water, food, vaccines and probiotics.

The poultry industry has seen some success in reducing antibiotic use in broiler chickens by 50% since 2015. This is an important step towards addressing antimicrobial resistance, but has yet to increase confidence in the industry's ability to grow truly antibiotic-free chicken.

IS LAB-GROWN CHICKEN TRULY ANTIBIOTIC-FREE?

Cultivated meat, also known as cultured or lab-grown meat, is real meat that is grown in a lab. This process typically begins by replicating cells in a petri dish. At Believer, we use fibroblast cells, because they are more stable and replicate quickly without genetic modification.

These cells replicate first in small samples and eventually in larger volumes within bioreactors where they grow into a dense biomass. We then separate it from the nutrient-rich medium in which it grew and fortify it with plant protein and combine it with other ingredients

In fact, our cultivated chicken is completely antibiotic free meat. We believe that lab-grown chicken is the best way to solve the antibiotic problem in the poultry industry today.

Our cultivated chicken does not require antibiotics because we grow it in a controlled, laboratory environment as opposed to conventional farms. This means that it is less likely to be contaminated with bacteria that can lead to food-borne illness.

WHAT ARE OTHER CULTIVATED MEAT ADVANTAGES?

In addition to being antibiotic-free, there are many cultivated meat advantages compared to traditional farming methods. The entire lab-grown meat process can be done in a single facility with a smaller environmental footprint than what is required for conventionally-farmed meat.

Cultivated meat is also a more humane way to produce meat. Many animals raised by conventional farming methods can be confined to small, crowded spaces and denied the ability to engage in natural behaviors, which can lead to more diseases and the need for antibiotics.

Cultivated meat eliminates the need to raise animals in these conditions, which is a major improvement in animal welfare.

LOOK OUT, ORGANIC CHICKEN, CULTIVATED MEAT IS (NEARLY) HERE

We broke ground on our first U.S. commercial-scale production facility in 2022 to produce meat that will offer consumers a way to enjoy the chicken that they crave without the adverse impacts on the environment, health, and food security compared to conventional farming methods.

We believe cultivated meat will revolutionize the industry by providing antibiotic-free meats so there is a real alternative to conventional farming methods that are often overusing antibiotics and leading to antibiotic resistance.

We are working hard to produce antibiotic-free chicken that is healthier for both people and the planet. By choosing brands like Believer, you can soon help support this transition towards antibiotic-free meats and contribute to a more sustainable future for all.

Stay up to date on the latest developments in the cultivated meat industry by visiting The Source, where we publish weekly articles and news updates.

At least on small farms, as far as I’m aware the only vaccination people commonly use is for Marek’s. You typically either buy all-vaccinated chicks or all non-vaccinated chicks. Marek’s is endemic. It’s kind of a personal choice and there’s surprisingly not much debate about it. However, getting a 100% Marek’s vaccinated flock may prevent you from having to make some pretty agonizing decisions later.

Having said that, maintaining a 20ish chicken flock for 7 years, we’ve never had a chicken that we raised from eggs/peeps die from Marek’s.

There are probably other vaccinations that large-scale houses might use but I don’t know what they would be.

As far as antibiotics, it’s hard to even use them in the first place, at least at the small scale. You’ll run across stories of people treating chickens with URIs with something like Tylan, but I’ve never had any success. Basically - chickens die from pretty much any illness. You basically give them very good conditions to live in and cross your fingers.

So in that way, yes, it is possible.

Many people believe that infections that require antibiotic treatment are an outcome of overcrowding and unnatural living conditions. I personally think that’s oversimplifying.

But yes - you can totally have a small scale chicken farm and never use a vaccine or an antibiotic.

There is one major disadvantage to using antibiotics for raising livestock. It is used chronically in low doses because this boosts growth, but this is the best way to encourage bacteria to evolve resistance to the antibiotics. You may have noticed that when you are prescribed a medicine by a physician, they tell you to use all of the pills even though your symptoms disappear much earlier. This is because partial doses may leave the bacteria alive that have some resistance. When this is repeated, a strain can slowly change to be completely resistant. Low doses of chronic antibiotics in farm animals can generate superbugs for which antibiotics no longer work. The thing about bacteria is that they routinely trade genes between entirely different species, and ones that prey on farm animals can trade their resistant genes with ones that infect humans. There are already some diseases for which there is no cure. The fact that this practice is allowed is a testament to the political power of the agribusiness lobby.

One has to consider the fact that industry raised animals for sale at neighborhood markets are almost impossible to raise in the close confines of feeding barns and sheds, due to the high number of animals being fattened. Because of the close confines, it would be impossible to treat one or more animals without treating all of them, so it would be more reasonable to the owners, for the owners to issue antibiotics on a regular basis.

When it comes to the ones that say there are no antibiotics, one should recall that no matter how an animal is harbored, if they have ‘free range’ then the animals may have unintended access to areas where all kinds of medicinals and chemicals have been used in the past. And it should be easy to realize that quite a number of these additives do not deteriorate but stay in the soil for an indefinite period.

The page following lists the difference between Natural, Antibiotic free, Free Range, Hormone Free, No GMO’s, Cage Free and Organic raised chickens: "Organic" Chicken Is Different Than "Antibiotic-Free" And "Natural" Means Nothing. These standards are set by the USA FDA. You can notice on this list, that there are a few categories for raising chicken that the FDA has no way to certify what the chicken has consumed.

Organic and Non-GMO’s marketed chickens have to pass inspection before they can be sold that way. However, there are those who claim that the farms raising these birds actually are not always truthful. Even though the USA FDA prohibits the use of hormones in chicken, but even though the place raising the birds is required to send documentation proof to the USA FDA, there is no intervention to test or inspect the birds before shipment.

Antibiotic Free raised chickens also fall into the category where you wind up taking the word of the company/person who raised the birds, because they are not tested, nor inspected.

As you can see, the major part of these so-called element and confinement-free birds are marketed only using the words of the farm owners.

The fear here is the fact that not only will chickens, but by consumption, people also will have an overload of these medications and develop unresponsiveness to those medications—-even over the counter medications in use today. See how many you recognize from the following:

QUOTE

“Antibiotics have been used in animal feed for about 50 years ever since the discovery not only as an anti-microbial agent, but also as a growth-promoting agent and improvement in performance. Tetracyclines, penicillin, streptomycin and bactrican soon began to be common additives in feed for livestock and poultry. Currently, the following antibiotics are used in livestock and poultry feed: chlortetracycline, procaine penicillin, oxytetracycline, tylosin, bacitracin, neomycin sulfate, streptomycin, erythromycin, linomycin, oleandomycin, virginamycin, and bambermycins. In addition to these antibiotics, which are of microbial origin, there are other chemically synthesized antimicrobial agents that are also sometimes used in animal feeds. These include three major classes of compounds: arsenical, nito-furan, and sulfa compounds. Arsenical compounds include arsanilic acid, 3-nitro-4-hydroxy phenylarsonic acid, and sodium arsanilate; nitro-furan compounds include furazolidone and nitro-furazone; sulfamethazine, sulfathiazole, and sulfaquinoxaline. Other chemicals are also used as antiprotozoal agents to prevent coccidiosis and histomaniasis in chickens and turkeys. Antibiotics are used regularly in animal feed at a rate of 2 to 50 grams per ton for improved performance in the animals. The reasons include a more efficient conversion of feed to animal products, an increased growth rate and a lower morbidity/mortality rate in general. The levels of antibiotics are often increased to 50-200 grams/ton or more when specific diseases are being targeted as when the spread of a particular disease is rampant. The levels are also increased in times of stress. This increased amount is often decreased when the threat of a disease is gone.”

END QUOTE

Effects of Antibiotics on Animal Feed

It is not a good idea to take fish antibiotics, and no vet is going to prescribe enough veterinary antibiotics to adequately treat a human. The antibiotics that are sold for fish and over the counter are older ones that have a very low degree of efficacy (working). Usually only 30% of bacteria are still susceptible to them, and this number will decrease rapidly as people use them incorrectly to treat themselves. If you do not take a large enough dose, not often enough per day, and not long enough (often 10 to 14 days), or take an antibiotic when you don’t have a bacterial infection that is susceptible to that antibiotic, you are creating resistant bacteria in your body. Those bacteria are the ones that are not killed outright by the antibiotic, so they are the only ones left in/on you. Thus your entire body will now be populated by antibiotic resistant bacteria, which are much harder to kill. Most people tend to not take enough, take irregularly spaced doses or miss doses, and only take the medicine till they feel better, 3 or 4 days. Most people also don’t have the training to recognize a viral infection from a bacterial one, or know which bacteria cause infections in what places and how to tell them apart. Nor do they know which antibiotics to take for which bacterial infections. So not only is this practice not very effective, it is making sure that these antibiotics won’t even be good anymore for what they were intended.

Some antibiotics are given to ill animals to get them over the illness. And some other kind of antibiotics are given to animals to try to prevent disease (when animals are raised in a stressful or disease riddled environment), and other antimicrobials are given to animals to manipulate the microbial flora in the animals’ intestinal tract- to try to get the animal to put on weight more efficiently. The concern with animals getting antibiotics that they don’t currently need, is will there be bacteria that become resistant to useful antibiotics, and they are coating the dead carcass of the animal you are about to eat…