The American fast food chain has given itself two years to stop serving antibiotic chicken in the United States. Good news for human health.
No more chicken with antibiotics at McDonald’s. Within two years, the American fast-food chain will implement a new antibiotic regulation, which will prohibit its suppliers from treating their poultry with antibiotics used in humans.
Beyond the com ‘- the group represents the symbol of junk food, and must face strong competition on the American market – the decision of the American giant should result in “putting pressure on its competitors. Chicken “has overtaken beef in terms of quantity sold in fast food”, analyze the New York Times.
With 14,000 American restaurants, McDonald’s is one of the biggest buyers of chicken in the United States, so its decision is expected to have a huge impact on the way poultry are raised, explains the NPR public radio.
Antibiotic resistance that could affect humans
This decision was welcomed by NGOs: “We are happy to learn that McDonald’s has finally understood that the general public no longer wants to eat food from industrial farms that abuse antibiotics”, greets Wenonah Hauter, head of the NGO Food & Water Watch, while judging the measures “insufficient”. “This is the first major food company to do so. It will be a game-changer here in the United States, ”says Laura Rogers of the NGO The Pew Charitable Trusts.
The intensive rearing of poultry and the increase in the number of diseases has prompted farmers to use an increasing number of antibiotics to prevent germs from contamination from destroying the farms. This intensive use has created germs in poultry which exhibit “antibiotic resistance”. However, many scientists are alarmed by the fact that this resistance to antibiotics can affect humans when they consume these products.
A limited presence of antibiotics in Europe since 2001
This decision, very symbolic in the United States where antibiotics are widely used in agriculture, should have little impact in Europe. Since 2001, the fast food chain has in fact been claiming to limit the proportion of chickens treated with antibiotics in its European menus to prevent possible diseases.
It remains to be seen whether this new anti-antibiotic policy will go beyond the announcement effect … It will have taken McDonald’s two years to succeed in establishing enough contracts to supply its restaurants with cucumber when it added the vegetable to his menus several years ago …
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