30 replies to this topic

[mmmbeans]

Last year, the Food and Drug Administration proposed a set of voluntary "guidelines" designed to nudge the meat industry to curb its antibiotics habit. Ever since, the agency has been mulling whether and how to implement the new program. Meanwhile, the meat industry has been merrily gorging away on antibiotics—and churning out meat rife with antibiotic-resistant pathogens—if the latest data from the FDA itself is any indication.

http://www.motherjon...ing-antibiotics


oh yea, this is good.

[Kurb]

Being handcuffed to the NC Pork industry I can assure you any number they give is a low one.

Factory farms are amazing and horrible at the same time.

Amazing at the production of food to feed a planet, horrible in the accelerated growth and over druggededness of the animals.

Antibiotics are like candy.

Resistance to tetracycline [an antibiotic] is up among Campylobacter on retail chicken. About 95% of chicken products were contaminated with Campylobacter, and nearly half of those bacteria were resistant to tetracyclines. This reflects an increase over last year and 2002.

This stuff is run through water lines in NC pig farms. I'd guess the yearly use of it is in the 100's or 1000's of tons. If a pig coughs in a house you put the whole group on tetracycline.

[Cary Kollins]

aaannnnnd that's another reason why I always buy organic from the sto. Shame I can't chose organic chx at bojangles

[Kurb]

I wouldn't trust "organic" meat from the sto either.

[mmmbeans]

I wouldn't trust "organic" meat from the sto either.

why not?

[Kurb]

why not?

B/C I don't trust much of anything.

From my limited understanding of it even some things labeled "organic" have some issues with antibiotics and what not.

But I am under educated on the subject of organic foods.

[mmmbeans]

B/C I don't trust much of anything.

From my limited understanding of it even some things labeled "organic" have some issues with antibiotics and what not.

But I am under educated on the subject of organic foods.

ok, i wasn't sure if you'd heard of anything specific... I've never read of any organic meat having antibiotics in it... though i'm sure some does slip through the cracks from less reputable providers.

[Kurb]

ok, i wasn't sure if you'd heard of anything specific... I've never read of any organic meat having antibiotics in it... though i'm sure some does slip through the cracks from less reputable providers.

Honestly I am tons more concerned over growth hormones and replacement hormones than I am antibiotics.

I KNOW what antibiotics will do. Do we, even now, really understand what happens to us b.c of growth hormones in meat and milk ?

[mmmbeans]

Honestly I am tons more concerned over growth hormones and replacement hormones than I am antibiotics.

I KNOW what antibiotics will do. Do we, even now, really understand what happens to us b.c of growth hormones in meat and milk ?

which is why i buy organic milk for my daughter... but we do know what over-use of antibiotics does... and it's really, really f*cking bad.

[Cary Kollins]

From what I've read, if you are going to buy only one organic product, buy milk.

That and apples.

FWIW, I was taking a bite into an Arby's roast beef sandwhich with cheese sauce when I opened this thread. Kind of made me want to throw up.

[mmmbeans]

don't worry... it's not actually roast beef.

[L.A. Fanatic]

in Eurpoe it's a huge problem

great movie in which this featured, Bullhead http://www.imdb.com/...1593/?ref_=sr_1

its on Netflix

[NanuqoftheNorth]

But the issue is, you have an economic logic, and you have an evolutionary and natural logic. And when you get to the cow, you see them come into conflict. It may well make sense economically to feed cows what we feed them, but ecologically, it's a disaster. It's a disaster for them because they're getting sick. If you look at a cow on a feedlot, it is not a happy camper. ...
Instead, we take the Midwest and we pave it essentially [with] corn and soybeans, and the environmental consequences of growing all that corn -- and most of the corn grown in this country goes to feed livestock -- is environmental degradation of the Midwest and the Gulf. There's a dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico a thousand miles wide that is the result of nitrogen runoff coming down the Mississippi and killing all the life in this zone in the Gulf. And that's coming directly from corn.
So you see the cow is connected to that dead zone in the Gulf, and the cow is connected to our health, too. All these things are connected. There is an ecological logic that is very different than the economic logic. And in that ecological logic, you can't separate the health of the cow, the health of the environment, and the health of the eater. http://www.pbs.org/w...ews/pollan.html

[Cary Kollins]

But the issue is, you have an economic logic, and you have an evolutionary and natural logic. And when you get to the cow, you see them come into conflict. It may well make sense economically to feed cows what we feed them, but ecologically, it's a disaster. It's a disaster for them because they're getting sick. If you look at a cow on a feedlot, it is not a happy camper. ...
Instead, we take the Midwest and we pave it essentially [with] corn and soybeans, and the environmental consequences of growing all that corn -- and most of the corn grown in this country goes to feed livestock -- is environmental degradation of the Midwest and the Gulf. There's a dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico a thousand miles wide that is the result of nitrogen runoff coming down the Mississippi and killing all the life in this zone in the Gulf. And that's coming directly from corn.
So you see the cow is connected to that dead zone in the Gulf, and the cow is connected to our health, too. All these things are connected. There is an ecological logic that is very different than the economic logic. And in that ecological logic, you can't separate the health of the cow, the health of the environment, and the health of the eater. http://www.pbs.org/w...ews/pollan.html

If only people weren't so gosh darn greedy.

[longtriad]

What about growth hormones?