Helps you choose healthier products: How do you know if chicken is grown without antibiotics?

The main source that informs you that the chicken has been raised without antibiotics is the special labeling of the packages, indicated in the message sent. "For more than a year, fresh chicken has appeared in Lithuania under the labels" Grown Without Antibiotics. "This labeling informs the buyer that during the entire growth process, the birds have not been treated. antibiotics, "said Saulius Petkevičius, board member of the World Poultry Association and Kekava Poultry Farm.

The approval of the SFVS (National Office of Food and Veterinary Affairs) is necessary for producers to be able to mark their production. This authority is responsible for the quality of products that reach the shelves of shopping centers.

"Getting a license for labeled chicken products" grown without antibiotics "is a long process." It is necessary to invest heavily in animal welfare so that they do not get sick and get sick. that they avoid antibiotic treatment, "says S. Petkevičius, and calls for careful consideration of the product before buying it. – Some manufacturers have started to grow chickens without antibiotics, but it is extremely complicated to produce enough products at a time, in which case the label "Grown without antibiotics" does not appear on all supermarkets packaging.) Products that look like those they are misleading: some are labeled and some are not. "

Antibiotic-free culture – A global trend?

WHO (World Health Organization) has for some time been arguing that antibiotic resistance is a sensitive, complex and increasingly important problem. Most responsibilities fall on the medical staff: to accurately test and identify the disease through antibiotic treatment. However, the food industry, and in particular meat, contributes a lot. Although antibiotics administered to animals are not prohibited in case of illness, they are responsible for the mutation of bacteria and the development of resistance to these drugs. Bacteria mutated with food enter our organisms, which not only survive, but also multiply.

One Health is a WHO-initiated movement that brings together physicians, the food industry, veterinarians and other professionals. The goal is to find interfaces, while seeking individual, social and ecosystem health. Intersectoral cooperation attempts to resolve and reduce the problem of antimicrobial resistance on the main axis of this movement.

In the poultry industry, this goal can be achieved by abandoning antibiotic treatment in chickens, "said S. Petkevičius about the initiatives of global organizations and the scale of the problem.

What is the non-antibiotic growth different from conventional poultry?

To raise chickens without antibiotics, it is necessary to create conditions preventing these birds from living. "In general, bird diseases are mainly influenced by raw materials of animal origin – fats, fishmeal.Of course, birds, like humans, need both animal and plant products, but animals of animal origin are more risky and less stable and should therefore be a very small part, so for S. Petkevičius, a quality food is the first and most important step in growing chickens without antibiotics – In addition, very important investments in poultry houses – birds must have enough space to move freely and have access to feeders.As humans, it is the rhythm of the day . "

The responsible breeding of chicken is important not only because of its direct impact on human health. "If the birds are treated with antibiotics, the bacteria that have mutated them will not only enter the body through the chicken, but through the chickens they will also fall into the soil, into the deep water, and through them – throughout the ecosystem, for example cereal crops, "says Petkevičius. If more and more manufacturers do not contribute to responsible animal production, the bacterial papillae resistant to these drugs will in the future be mutilated by the antibiotics of the whole ecosystem.