Chicken is not only delicious but super healthy compared to other meats. However, people who consume chicken may want to rethink their menu for dinner since the consumption of this meat may pose a danger if the bird was injected with antibiotics when it was alive.
Benefits of chicken meat
Chicken meat has many benefits such as building muscles, helping us keep fit, boosting immunity, promoting heart health or reducing symptoms of PMS. In addition, when cooked right, chicken meat can taste heavenly.
That’s why the demand for this white meat has been noticeably increasing in the past few years.
Nevertheless, the growing demand for chicken meat poses deadly health risks because of the abuse of antibiotics, mainly by those operating medium and large-scale chicken farms.
Underlying risks in consuming chicken meat
Scientists claim that farmers are arbitrarily injecting the birds with antibiotics to stimulate growth, prevent different illnesses and fatten broilers quickly.
The amount and types of drugs injected into chickens should be precise according to what the law allows.
Nevertheless, as chicken farmers want higher profits quicker, many inject more types of drugs with higher dosages into the birds.
Drug-resistant ‘super bugs’
Injecting chickens indiscriminately creates drug-resistant “super bugs” i.e. a condition when bacteria is still able to survive and develop regardless of medications administered.
In other words, super bugs can make sick people resistant to different types of antibiotics. Accordingly, a common cold can be deathly now, since antibiotics will not work on chicken eaters.
Other viruses
According to a study last year by the Kenya Medical Research Institute (Kemri), retail chicken sold in Nairobi was not only contaminated with high levels of drugs but also contained potentially pathogenic multidrug-resistant strains of E Coli.
Normally, the bacterium E Coli found in the intestines of humans as well as animals is harmless. However, the E Coli found in retail chicken is extremely dangerous as it is capable of causing severe food poisoning leading to death if not well treated.
The study claimed that approximately 75% of the isolates were resistant to at least one out of 12 antibiotics tested, and 40.4% were positive for 10 virulence genes.
Salmonella, another group of bacteria that commonly causes food poisoning, is also becoming antibiotic-resisted.
Rather than only chicken meat, salmonella can be found in various types of products, ranging from meat and eggs to milk.
Similar to E Coli, once a person has salmonella in their system, they will experience diarrhoea, stomach cramps, vomiting as well as severe fever.
Chicken meat provides us with a wide range of benefits in terms of keeping fit and staying healthy. Nevertheless, as its meat can be contaminated by antibiotic injections, make sure your source of chicken is legal.
This article was written in collaboration with Naluri and first appeared in hellodoktor.com. The Hello Health Group does not provide medical advice, diagnosis or treatment.