Rural chicken farms commonly feed antibiotics, and pig and cattle farms also use them
Villagers say: Our chickens all eat antibiotics
Experts say that taking some to prevent chicken plague is no big deal, but if the drugs are still not stopped 7 days before being sent to slaughter, that is very frightening
Our reporter Li Yang and Xu Yan
Chicken is a frequent guest on people's dining tables. Because it contains less saturated fatty acid, it is healthier than red meat such as pork and mutton. But for days in a row, reports about illegal chicken farming have repeatedly appeared in newspapers. On December 11, this newspaper reported news about hormone-forced “fast-grown chickens.” On December 18, CCTV once again exposed that white-feathered chicken farmers in Tengzhou, Shandong, and other places illegally used multiple antibiotics and banned drugs, which once again called the safety of chicken into question. Why are antibiotics used in chicken farming? Can this kind of chicken still be eaten? A reporter from “Life Times” interviewed relevant experts on this matter.
The use of antibiotics is very common
On December 18, according to a CCTV report, in order to prevent white-feathered broiler chickens from getting sick or dying, some farms have a set of chicken-raising “secret methods,” that is, from the first day the chickens enter the coop, they give the chickens antibiotic liquid twice a day.
In this regard, Mr. Wang, who previously ran a chicken farm in rural Hebei, told a “Life Times” reporter that the scale of chicken farming in rural areas is generally not large, and most chicken farmers have a relatively low level of education. Each person's method and frequency of adding antibiotics to the chickens they raise are not quite the same. Many farmers just listen to what others say and then imitate it. They do not know which drugs are prohibited, and there is simply no professional person to guide them. Wang told the reporter helplessly that chickens are especially prone to illness. If they are not given antibiotics, they may all die overnight. And often, if one household has chicken plague, the whole village will be affected. Farmers really cannot afford the losses, and some farmers even give up raising chickens because of this.
According to a report by “International Herald Leader,” the phenomenon of feeding antibiotics does not exist only on chicken farms. Pigs, dairy cows, and even artificially farmed fish and shrimp face the same fate. Some data show that China produces about 210,000 tons of antibiotic raw materials each year, of which 97,000 tons of antibiotics are used in the livestock and aquaculture industries, accounting for 46.1% of total annual output, and the use of large amounts of antibiotics in animal farming is a very common phenomenon. However, as early as 2006, the European Union completely banned the inclusion of any type of antibiotics in feed, and many countries subsequently followed suit.
Drug use must be stopped 7 days before being sent to slaughter
“Chickens also get sick, and when they are sick they need medicine.” Chen Jilan from the poultry research office of the Beijing Institute of Animal Science and Veterinary Medicine, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, told a “Life Times” reporter, “The key is to strictly observe the drug withdrawal period.” According to the Ministry of Agriculture's regulations on broiler chicken breeding management, all drugs must be stopped 7 days before broiler chickens are sent to slaughter, but this regulation has become a mere scrap of paper on many chicken farms. Some farmers said that in actual practice, drugs are generally stopped 3 days before market, because if they were stopped for 7 days, the chickens might die, so drugs must be used to keep them alive. Wang said that farmers using antibiotics is truly a matter of having no choice, and they also hope for better breeding technology to help them become wealthy.
Zhu Yi, associate professor at the College of Food Science and Nutritional Engineering of China Agricultural University [Weibo], told a “Life Times” reporter that if drugs are stopped 7 days before market, the chickens themselves can metabolize the antibiotics in their bodies, so eating this kind of chicken is not a problem. But if the drugs are not stopped in time, antibiotic residues will remain in the animal's body, and when people eat it, it is equivalent to “eating second-hand antibiotics.” Long-term consumption of “antibiotic-containing food” will also cause the human body's drug resistance to increase without notice. It is equivalent to burying a “hidden bomb” in the human body. Once illness occurs in the future, there may be no medicine that can treat it. In addition, some experts remind that eating “antibiotic-containing food” may also cause people to develop hives or allergic symptoms and other adverse reactions. Many American medical scientists also believe that “the abuse of antibiotics in animals is clearly related to human infection with drug-resistant bacteria.”
Do not eat more than 100 grams of meat per day
Although the Ministry of Agriculture has set maximum residue standards for antibiotics in animal-derived foods, with the rapid development of meat products in recent years and the lack of systematic supervision of antibiotic use in the breeding industry in China, it is also very difficult for relevant departments to test every batch of marketed livestock and poultry meat products for antibiotic residues and other substances. And even if farmers are found to have illegally used antibiotics, the penalties are generally criticism, education, and fines, which is not enough deterrence. It is understood that suppliers for large fast-food chains also sample only 3—4 chickens out of every 5,000 for drug residue testing in farmer-raised chickens, or even as few as two, which undoubtedly leads to a large number of “fish that slip through the net.”
Of course, on one hand relevant departments should strengthen supervision, and on the other hand enterprises should also strengthen self-discipline. Zhu Yi said, “Safe food is produced, not supervised into existence. Enterprises must strictly control the first gate of food safety from the source.” In addition, Professor Lu, dean of the College of Food Science and Technology at Nanjing Agricultural University, said that accelerating the development of biological feed additives to replace antibiotics is also one of the ways to avoid antibiotic abuse.