Americans are under threat from antibiotic-resistant superbugs, making us vulnerable to common, once treatable infections. A remarkable 80 percent of antibiotics sold in the U.S. are used not by humans, but by the meat and poultry industries so factory farm animals can grow faster and survive crowded and unsanitary conditions.
This is creating superbugs on the farm, and humans are exposed in a number of ways, including when we handle or eat undercooked meat. Our life-saving drugs are becoming less effective when we really need them. Unfortunately, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has refused to take meaningful action to restrict the use of unnecessary antibiotics in livestock production.
We’re calling on Trader Joe’s to only source their meat from animals raised without antibiotics. As one of the most progressive national retailers, Trader Joe’s has already demonstrated care for their customers’ health by saying no to GMOs, artificial colors and trans fats in the products they sell. Trader Joe’s can also be a leader by helping move the livestock industry in the right direction. Read more>>
Farm Use of Antibiotics Defies Scrutiny
Published: September 3, 2012
The numbers released quietly by the federal government this year were alarming. A ferocious germ resistant to many types of antibiotics had increased tenfold on chicken breasts, the most commonly eaten meat on the nation’s dinner tables.
Eighty percent of the antibiotics sold in the United States goes to chicken, pigs, cows and other animals that people eat, yet producers of meat and poultry are not required to report how they use the drugs — which ones, on what types of animal, and in what quantities. This dearth of information makes it difficult to document the precise relationship between routine antibiotic use in animals and antibiotic-resistant infections in people, scientists say. Read more>>
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