Is your kosher chicken safe to eat? Based on a new study by researchers from Johns Hopkins, the answer is that, most likely, your chicken – kosher or non-kosher – is not safe to eat. Here's why.
According to a new Johns Hopkins study, inorganic arsenic causes cancer, and 88% of chickens raised in the US are fed arsenic-based drugs and have very high levels of inorganic arsenic in their meat, 2 to 3 times higher than the FDA says is safe:
"…Conventional, antibiotic-free, and USDA Organic chicken samples were
purchased from 10 U.S. metropolitan areas between December 2010 and June
2011, when an arsenic-based drug then manufactured by Pfizer and known
as roxarsone was readily available to poultry companies that wished to
add it to their feed. In addition to inorganic arsenic, the researchers
were able to identify residual roxarsone in the meat they studied; in
the meat where roxarsone was detected, levels of inorganic arsenic were
four times higher than the levels in USDA Organic chicken (in which
roxarsone and other arsenicals are prohibited from use).
"Arsenic-based
drugs have been used in poultry production for decades. Arsenical drugs
are approved to make poultry grow faster and improve the pigmentation
of the meat. The drugs are also approved to treat and prevent parasites
in poultry. In 2010, industry representatives estimated that 88 percent
of the roughly nine billion chickens raised for human consumption in the
U.S. received roxarsone. In July 2011, Pfizer voluntarily removed
roxarsone from the U.S. market, but the company may sell the drug
overseas and could resume marketing it in the U.S. at any time. Pfizer
still domestically markets the arsenical drug nitarsone, which is
chemically similar to roxarsone. Currently in the U.S., there is no
federal law prohibiting the sale or use of arsenic-based drugs in
poultry feed. (In January, Maryland became the first U.S. state to ban
the use of most arsenicals in chicken feed.)…"
I asked Empire's spokesman if Empire used Roxarsone before it was pulled from the market. He told me he did not know. I asked him to check and let me know. Ten days have passed with no answer.
I asked the Agri Star spokesperson who pushed the Agri Star meat donation to Oklahoma tornado victims story if Agri Star or its suppliers uses any arsenic-based drugs. More than a week has passed with no answer.
I asked Naftali Hanau of Grow and behold Foods the same question. He said his suppliers don't use arsenic-based drugs. I asked him for a certified third-party audit or other proof and he told that Grow and Behold checks the farms and knows the farmers personally.
And that might be okay – or it might not be okay.
Why?
In 2011 when Grow and Behold started slaughtering cattle, I asked Hanau where the cattle were being slaughtered. He wouldn't answer the question, claiming a need for secrecy.
I asked the third-party audit question with regard to humane raising and handling of the animals, and he said he audited the farm(s) himself and knew what he was doing because he had worked on farms for years.
Grow and Behold was founded in the wake of the various Agriprocessors scandals and as a type of response to them, and i found Hanau's attitude and his answers wanting.
So I asked him one more question: how much money do the non-Jewish workers at the slaughterhouse where your cattle are slaughtered make per hour? Are they unionized? Does they get health insurance and, if they do, what is their copay?
Hanau did not know the answers to any of those questions and had to ask the company to find out. (Answers: $14 per hour, unionized amount of health insurance copay not given.)
Apparently for Hanau, that the beef was grass-fed beef was far more important than how human beings producing it were being treated.
So when you buy Grow and Behold products, you do so because you trust Hanau – not because there is any valid third-party certification or audit.
I think it is very likely Hanau's chicken is grown without any arsenic-based drugs, and despite his poor attitude, I'm inclined to trust him.
As for the other kosher chicken producers and the non-kosher chicken producers, except for those certified organic you should presume arsenic-based drugs were used. And what you eat, you eat at your own peril.
Will the OU and other kosher supervisors now ban arsenic-based drugs? The study has been public for a month now and so far, the none of these kosher supervisors have banned the drugs – even though halakha says that a sakana (danger to life and health) supersedes basic halakha and is always judged stringently, meaning that according to halakha, these drugs should have been banned by the OU, etc., last month – but they were not.
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Update 6-28-2013 5:56 pm CDT – Empire now tells me that it does not use any arsenic-based drugs in its poultry feed or in any other way. That information and more updates are in my new post, which you can read here.
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The full Johns Hopkins press release:
Poultry Drug Increases Levels of Toxic Arsenic in Chicken Meat
Johns Hopkins School of Public Health
Chickens likely raised with arsenic-based drugs result in chicken meat that has higher levels of inorganic arsenic, a known carcinogen, according to a new study led by researchers at the Johns Hopkins Center for a Livable Future at the Bloomberg School of Public Health.
This is the first study to show concentrations of specific forms of arsenic (e.g., inorganic arsenic versus other forms) in retail chicken meat, and the first to compare those concentrations according to whether or not the poultry was raised with arsenical drugs. The findings provide evidence that arsenical use in chickens poses public health risks and indicate that the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the agency responsible for regulating animal drugs, should ban arsenicals. The study was published online today in the scientific journal Environmental Health Perspectives.
Conventional, antibiotic-free, and USDA Organic chicken samples were purchased from 10 U.S. metropolitan areas between December 2010 and June 2011, when an arsenic-based drug then manufactured by Pfizer and known as roxarsone was readily available to poultry companies that wished to add it to their feed. In addition to inorganic arsenic, the researchers were able to identify residual roxarsone in the meat they studied; in the meat where roxarsone was detected, levels of inorganic arsenic were four times higher than the levels in USDA Organic chicken (in which roxarsone and other arsenicals are prohibited from use).
Arsenic-based drugs have been used in poultry production for decades. Arsenical drugs are approved to make poultry grow faster and improve the pigmentation of the meat. The drugs are also approved to treat and prevent parasites in poultry. In 2010, industry representatives estimated that 88 percent of the roughly nine billion chickens raised for human consumption in the U.S. received roxarsone. In July 2011, Pfizer voluntarily removed roxarsone from the U.S. market, but the company may sell the drug overseas and could resume marketing it in the U.S. at any time. Pfizer still domestically markets the arsenical drug nitarsone, which is chemically similar to roxarsone. Currently in the U.S., there is no federal law prohibiting the sale or use of arsenic-based drugs in poultry feed. (In January, Maryland became the first U.S. state to ban the use of most arsenicals in chicken feed.)
Lead author Keeve Nachman, PhD, said, “The suspension of roxarsone sales is a good thing in the short term, but it isn’t a real solution. Hopefully this study will persuade FDA to ban the drug and permanently keep it off the market.”
Chronic inorganic arsenic exposure has been shown to cause lung, bladder and skin cancers and has been associated with other conditions, as well, including heart disease, type 2 diabetes, cognitive deficits, and adverse pregnancy outcomes. According to National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey data, at least 75 percent of Americans regularly eat chicken.
The FDA has not established safety standards for inorganic arsenic in foods, although the agency did, for a brief time in 2011, suggest that concentrations should be well below 1 microgram per kilogram of meat. The levels of inorganic arsenic discovered in the meat where roxarsone was found were two and three times greater than that level.
Another significant finding of the study is that when roxarsone was present in raw meat, cooking decreased the levels of roxarsone and increased the levels of inorganic arsenic.
The authors of the study are Keeve E. Nachman, PhD, Patrick A. Baron, MHS, Georg Raber, PhD, Kevin A. Francesconi, PhD, Ana Navas-Acien, MD, PhD, and David C. Love, PhD.