When you head to the supermarket and check out the chicken breasts in the refrigerated section, you probably don’t think they’re the most appetising thing out there. But you’ll probably pick them up anyway because they’re one of the “healthiest” meats out there.
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Well, it turns out you might be making a serious mistake as a recent study has found that 22 out of 92 chicken pieces bought at seven major supermarkets contained an antibiotic resistant super strain of E-coli. So you’ve pretty much got a one in four chance of contracting the killer disease every time you pick up one of those chunks of meat.
Mark Holmes of the University Of Cambridge explained the results:
The levels of resistant E.coli that we have found are worrying.
Every time someone falls ill, instead of just getting a food poisoning bug they might also be getting a bug that is antibiotic resistant.
If they end up developing sepsis or a urinary tract infection they may well find they have a bug that is resistant to the first choice antibiotic.
By the time they get on to the right antibiotic the bug could be out of control. It can even lead to death.
I am concerned that insufficient resources are being put into the surveillance of antibiotic resistance in farm animals and retail meat.
Yeah no shit. Apparently, 5,500 people a year in the UK die as a result of contracting E.coli, so maybe put that piece of chicken down and try the Quorn next time. Or at least swap it for pork, if you’re not convinced by these pro-vegetarian arguments that you simply can’t argue with.