Des Moines Register

Anti-drug bacteria found in meat

By PERRY BEEMAN
Register Staff Writer
12/10/2002

A new study of ground turkey and chicken from supermarkets in Des Moines and Minneapolis found the meat heavily contaminated by drug-resistant bacteria associated with food poisoning.

That means people could get seriously ill with infections that common antibiotic treatments might not knock down. Some of the bacteria were resistant to drugs considered a last resort, including Cipro.

Most people can avoid trouble by properly handling and cooking their food, health officials said. People with weakened immune systems, the very young and the elderly are in greater danger of getting sick from the bacteria.

"All it takes is cutting a chicken on a cutting board, then using the same knife to cut the vegetables," said Dubuque pediatrician Charles Winterwood, chairman of the Iowa Sierra Club.

The Iowa Chapter of the Sierra Club teamed with the Minneapolis-based Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy to test 200 packages of ground turkey and 200 whole chickens taken from grocery shelves in September-half from each city.

Their message: Consumers may want to buy meat billed as organic - from animals that weren't fed antibiotics as growth stimulants. Otherwise, they face a small but serious risk of a hard-to-treat, potentially fatal infection. The groups note that even so-called organic meat could be contaminated in processing.

A certified laboratory in Florida, ABC Research Corp. of Gainsville, Fla., did the tests, which looked at Camplylobacter, salmonella and enterococci.

The meat came from Hy-Vee and Dahl's stores and included Honeysuckle White ground turkey and Country Pride whole chickens. Representatives of Hy-Vee and Dahl's declined comment because they hadn't seen the study.

Consumers interviewed were not shaken by the findings.

"I cook my food well done, so I don't think it makes a difference," said Mary Burton, 43, of Des Moines, who was shopping at the Harding Hills Hy-Vee, a store included in the study. "If it is on sale, I will get it."

Emma Edgington, 54, of Des Moines shopped Monday at one of the stores tested, the Dahl's at 4343 Merle Hay Road. She said she might buy organic, but was worried more about price than health threats.

"It just depends; the price of organic is a little high," said Edgington, a professional caterer. She bought an "all-natural" Smart Chicken on Monday.

The nonprofit groups that did the study have pushed for poultry raisers to cut the use of antibiotics, which also are routinely fed to hogs. They said they didn't check pork because the testing is expensive. A representative of the institute couldn't say what the study cost.

Major poultry companies, including Country Pride, have recently announced that they are reducing the animal use of some antibiotics critical to human medicine.

The nonprofit groups billed the study as the first of its kind that named the brands and the stores involved.

Ron Phillips of the Animal Health Institute, representing the pharmaceutical industry, said the risk of foodborne illnesses that are resistant to antibiotics is dropping as farmers use antibiotics more sparingly.

"Veterinarians and producers are getting smarter every day on the use of antibiotics," Phillips said. "The extremely small risk that antibiotic resistance would be passed from animals to humans is getting even smaller.

"Most patients with bacterial food poisoning don't need to be treated with antibiotics, said the institute's David Wallinga, a doctor.

"But for those whose infections spread beyond the intestine, antibiotic treatment can be life-saving," he said.

Findings
CAMPYLOBACTER: A total of 95 percent of chickens were contaminated, of which 62 percent were resistant to antibiotics. Campylobacter is the most common bacterial cause of diarrheal illness in the nation.

SALMONELLA: A common cause of food poisoning, it was found in 45 percent of the turkey samples and 18 percent of the chickens tested. Nearly 6 percent of the salmonella in chickens and 62 percent in turkeys were resistant to antibiotics. Nearly a third of the salmonella in turkeys resisted at least four antibiotics.

ENTEROCOCCI: Nearly every chicken and ground turkey sample carried enterococci bacteria resistant to at least one antibiotic; some were resistant to multiple antibiotics.


Erin E. Jordahl
Director, Iowa Chapter Sierra Club
3839 Merle Hay Road, Suite 280
Des Moines, IA 50310
515-277-8868
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