Life in a world without antibiotics

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Did you know that the recent outbreak of salmonella that came from three Foster Farms plants was antibiotic resistant? The strain was salmonella Heidelberg, and it is resistant to four of the major antibiotic drugs.

The dosing of chickens, pigs and cows in order to reduce disease caused by over crowding (and slightly increase weight) has led to this.

Things to note.

  1. Foster Farms was shipping out this antibiotic resistant strain of Salmonella Heidenberg on 25 percent of its chickens.
    That includes all Safeway chicken and Costco. (USDA figures from Oct 5, 2013)

  2. The USDA cut a deal with Foster farms to not recall the chicken, even though the contamination level was one out of every 4 chickens. They sent a warning letter that said, 'Yes it’s contaminated but if you cook it correctly and handle it correctly it is safe."

  3. Approximately 18,000 people were unable to cook it correctly or handle it perfectly (or someone who fed them made a mistake) and they got food poisoning. over 500 of those so bad they were hospitalized. (the CDC created multiplier for hospitalized to ill is 38.5)

  4. Costco DID remove the chickens from the shelves, even though it wasn’t recalled and was "safe. Safeway did not remove the contaminated chicken from its shelves. Safeway customers have a greater chance of being exposed to this antibiotic resistant strain of Salmonella.

In a recent story over at io9 FDA data indicates there are close to 150,000 illnesses reported every year due to eggs contaminated by Salmonella.
From the article:

The other reason Americans tend to refrigerate their eggs: our risk of Salmonella poisoning is often significantly higher than it is overseas, because our chickens are more likely to carry it. In the UK, for instance, it is required by law that all hens be immunized against Salmonella. This protection measure, enacted in the late 1990s, has seen Salmonella cases in Britain drop from 14,771 reported cases in 1997 to just 581 cases in 2009. (link to article)

The role of Big Chicken, Big Pig and Big Beef in this situation is clear. They also use their lobbying power to refuse to change their ways. That requirement to immunize chickens that the UK used? It was shot down in the US because of lobbying power.
Just another place for antibiotic strains of salmonella to rise up.

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