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By Lisa Baertlein
Reuters

Perdue Foods said on Wednesday they have stopped using antibiotics at its chicken hatcheries, completing a five-year effort directed at curbing the unnecessary using antibiotics.

The action comes amid growing concern among public health experts worldwide regarding the link between excessive antibiotic used in animal agriculture and human infections from antibiotic-resistant bacteria, or so-called superbugs which do not interact with conventional treatment.

The National Chicken Council said the move makes Perdue the very first large U.S. chicken producer to separate antibiotic easily use in all hatcheries irrespective of series.

“By don\’t using any antibiotics in our hatcheries or any human antibiotics in feed, we’ve reached the stage where 95 % your chickens never get any human antibiotics,” said Bruce Stewart-Brown, Perdue Foods’ senior vice president of food safety, quality and live operations.

Stewart-Brown added that Perdue’s antibiotic-free hatchery policy exceeds the federal government Drug Administration’s voluntary guidelines for antibiotic utilize in food animals, together with the standards with the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s organic certification program.

Perdue stated it does make use of animal-only antibiotic to operate an intestinal parasite, and may use antibiotics to deal with and control illness in sick flocks.

Perdue, whose Harvestland brand features no-antibiotics-ever products, said hello does not use antibiotics for growth promotion in the chicken production, and contains not since 2007.

One public health advocacy group representing consumer, health, agricultural together with other interest groups stated it approved of Perdue’s move. “Encounter inside the hatcheries is especially significant as antibiotic use there is clearly associated with resistance inside the treated birds and to resistance in sick humans,” Keep Antibiotics Working (KAW) said in the statement.

KAW also encouraged Perdue to publicly report the amount and type of antibiotics included in its poultry and encouraged other companies to consider the same policy.

“I\’m hoping Perdue’s actions foreshadow changes through the industry, and embolden regulators to prohibit the misuse of antibiotics in animal agriculture,” said Caroline Smith DeWaal, food safety director at the Center for Science inside the Public Interest.

Perdue Farms, a division of family-owned Perdue Farms, of Salisbury, Maryland, is fourth-largest U.S. producer of ready-to-cook chicken after Tyson Foods Inc, Pilgrim’s Pride Corp and Sanderson Farms Inc, good National Chicken Council.

Reporting by Lisa Baertlein in La and Tom Polansek in Chicago