'Health crisis' linked to animal antibiotics

ShopRite's brand of antibiotic-free chicken.

Consumer Reports has issued its strongest statement to date on the use of antibiotics to raise animals for human consumption.

The popular consumer magazine, which accepts no advertising, is calling on all grocers "to require their meat suppliers to reduce antibiotics in livestock production [on factory farms], and we urge shoppers to support those efforts by buying meat labeled 'no antibiotics' when they can."

On Page 6 of the August 2012 issue, Consumers Union -- the magazine's policy and action arm -- said it "believes that sharply limiting antibiotic use in animals is necessary to preserve the effectiveness of drugs for treating diseases in people."

"The declining effectiveness of antibiotics is becoming a national health crisis.

"A whopping 80 percent of the antibiotics in the U.S. are used not for human health but by the meat and poultry industry to make animals grow faster and to prevent sickness in crowded and unsanitary conditions."

For more information, go to a Consumers Union  Web site: Meat Without Drugs

You can usually find low-quality Perdue chicken --which is raised on plenty of harmful antibiotics -- at 40% off in ShopRite supermarkets.

Can Can sale

ShopRite supermarkets offer antibiotic-free Readington Farms poultry, as well as products from Coleman Organic, but it still runs fire sales on Perdue and other low-quality chicken raised on antibiotics, as it is doing now during the Summer Can Can Sale.

I prefer to buy seltzer and pasta sauce at Can Can prices.

I've now amassed 144 cans of Adirondack Lemon-Lime Seltzer, enough to last until the next Can Can Sale.

Packs of 12 12-ounce cans are $1.99 during the 10th anniversary sale, a discount of $1.80.

I also picked up six 24-ounce jars of Classico pasta sauce at two for $4: Tomato and Basil, Spicy Tomato and Basil, and Cabernet Marinara With Herbs.

Bottled pasta sauce is just a base, because we add a can of anchovies and oil, red-pepper flakes and dried Italian herbs.

Last night, we also added capers to the sauce from one and a half Classico bottles, and used it with 1 pound of Trader Joe's Organic Whole Wheat Spaghetti. 

 

H Mart

Baby mustard greens were only 68 cents a pound on Sunday at the Little Ferry H Mart.

Wash greens and blanch them in boiling water. Drain the pot, and add salt and other seasonings, and olive oil. For an Asian  flavor, try a little soy sauce and sesame oil.

For breakfast on Monday, leftover mustard greens went well with an open-face egg-white omelet of smoked wild Alaskan sockeye salmon and capers.

Mung-bean pancakes are among the many free weekend samples at H Mart stores.

Perdue speaks out on its use of antibiotics

Image via Wikipedia

Perdue Farms founder Frank Perdue.

After my last post, How most chicken and beef are raised, a Perdue spokesman commented on whether the company uses antibiotics to promote growth. Here is Perdue's position statement on antibiotics from its Web site:

"We recognize concerns about the use of antibiotics in animal production, even though the science linking antibiotic use in animal production is still under debate.

"Perdue does not use antibiotics for growth promotion and administers them only when necessary for the health of our birds.

"As a result of our emphasis on providing a healthy environment for our birds, we do not need to rely on the continuous use of antibiotics to keep our birds healthy. However, in keeping with our commitment to poultry welfare and to providing wholesome products, our company's team of veterinarians, who are board-certified by the American College of Poultry Veterinarians, may prescribe antibiotics when medically appropriate. These antibiotics are used in stringent accordance with FDA and USDA guidelines and only under the guidance of one of our veterinarians.

"To treat intestinal illness in chickens, we may also administer ionophores when medically appropriate. Ionophores are a type of antibiotic not used in human medicine and are not linked to concerns over antibiotic resistance in humans. The FDA and USDA have approved this use of ionophores."

The key phrase here is "continuous use of antibiotics."

That's why you don't see an antibiotics-free claim on Perdue packaging. But other producers, including Readington Farms, a brand sold at ShopRite, state explicitly that no antibiotics are used to raise its chickens.

First-time sale on ShopRite's drug-free chicken

The ShopRite in Paramus looks old and the parking lot is cramped. When I shopped there last week, a large piece of land across from the store was being cleared and my stomach sank as I wondered if all of this had been trees.

The store's sales circular, which arrived with the newspaper, has a nugget buried in the back pages: the first sale I have ever seen on Readington Farms chicken, the ShopRite brand that is antibiotic-free and raised on vegetarian feed. The sale starts Sunday and runs through Oct. 24 at the Paramus store.

The discount is 25%, or $1.11 to $4.49 a pound, compared with the 50% sale ShopRite stores recently had on inferior, drug-filled Perdue chicken. My wife prefers the taste of Readington Farms chicken over Murray's free-roaming chicken, the drug-free brand sold by Fairway Market.

The most dangerous room in the house

I have long felt the kitchen is the most dangerous room in the house, given the controversies over cookware, dinnerware and the industrial methods applied to how much of our food is grown or raised. (See last post, "If it's made in China, is it safe?")

There is plenty of good, healthy food on sale, but it is usually only a fraction of what a normal supermarket carries. I have visited Costco, Super Stop & Shop and ShopRite in the past week or two and watched what other consumers select.

Drawn by low prices and deceptive TV advertising, a lot of people are buying that crappy Perdue chicken and passing up healthier alternatives -- chicken raised on vegetarian feed and without antibiotics.

Fairway Market occasionally puts Murray's free-roaming chicken on sale, but ShopRite rarely discounts its drug-free Readington Farms poultry. Yet ShopRite will turn around and offer drug-free Australian beef at bargain-basement prices. Stop & Shop has a line of natural food called Nature's Promise -- poultry, beef and pork, among other items -- and sometimes offers discounts. Whole Foods Market frequently puts its naturally raised food on sale, but prices are still higher than most competitors.

This afternoon, there was an online auction at dailywish.amexnetwork.com offering $50 back on a purchase of $100 or $25 back on a $50 purchase at Whole Foods Market, but it sold out quickly.

Can supermarkets promote unadulterated food better? I think so. A consistent sales policy -- discounting both conventional and naturally raised food -- would go a long way toward that goal. I don't mind paying more for food that costs more to produce, but give me a break once in a while.

And the media, which depend on supermarkets for precious advertising dollars, virtually ignore the challenge of shopping for food these days, lest they have to criticize these food giants for sales policies that seduce consumers into making the wrong choices.

A sale on chicken I won't be shopping

A package of Readington Farms chicken thighs (July 2012).

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

On Saturday afternoon, I stopped at the ShopRite in Rochelle Park to take a closer look at the Perdue chicken being sold for 50% off today through Oct. 3. 

What I saw convinced me that this is among the worst chicken you can buy.

For example, a Perdue pre-seasoned roaster is "enhanced" with up to 17% seasoned chicken broth. That means you are paying 17% of the price for broth, not poultry. 

This 6-pound bird is going for a mere $4.99, but it likely was raised on antibiotics and there's nothing on the label about a vegetarian diet. So it might have eaten feed with bits of dead chicken.

Yet the label has the meaningless phrase "All natural," and notes the chicken contains no hormones or steroids, which are barred by federal rules anyway, so why is it on the label if not to deceive the consumer?

The unseasoned Perdue roaster was selling for less than half the price of the Readington Farms roaster ($1.89 a pound), which is fed a vegetarian diet and raised without antibiotics. 

ShopRite rarely puts Readington Farms poultry on sale. A Coleman organic roaster was selling for $2.99 a pound on Saturday with a $2 off coupon attached.

Update

In 2014, Consumer Reports magazine investigated antibiotics and arsenic in food.

Here are links to this blog's discussion of the articles:

Snowy Atlantic cod, arsenic in food and more

Consumer Reports: Buy only antibiotic-free chicken

Do these chickens have a prostate problem?

Have you looked closely at the label of the fresh chicken you bring home from the supermarket? Does the phrase "retained water" appear on the label? Doesn't this sound like these birds have swollen prostates?

Don't worry. You won't find these chickens getting up during the night to use the bathroom.

For several years now, chicken farmers have been injecting their birds with a salt-water solution during processing to improve the flavor. The organic, free-range chicken I brought home from Whole Foods Market in Paramus this evening contains 5% of this salt-water solution. Readington Farms, the ShopRite brand of drug-free chicken, also contains retained water. I don't have any Murray's free-roaming chicken in my freezer, but the next time I go to Fairway Market, I'll check the label.

I can understand injecting lousy chicken, such as Perdue and Tyson, with salt water for better flavor. But drug-free, free-roaming and organic chickens already taste good. Do they need the extra seasoning, and do we have to pay 5% or more of the price for salted water?