Doing the funky chicken

[Guest guest]

Arsenic in Chicken By Michael Greger, M.D.

http://www.veganmd.com

Originally published February 2004

After reviewing 5,000 chicken samples, researchers from the National

Institutes of Health and the U. S. Department of Agriculture’s Food Safety

Inspection Service recently reported alarmingly high levels of arsenic

contamination in the flesh of “broiler chickens”—chickens raised for meat.[1]

These government researchers found that the amount of arsenic in chicken greatly

exceeded the Environmental Protection Agency’s new upper safety limit of arsenic

allowed in drinking water. In fact, the amount of arsenic found in chicken was 6

to 9 times that allowed by the EPA. A “bucket” of KFC fried chicken would be

expected to have up to almost 50 times the amount of arsenic allowed in a glass

of water.[2]

How did the arsenic get into the chickens? The poultry industry fed it to

them. Most broiler chickens are fed arsenic in the United States.[3,4] Although

fish and shellfish also present significant dietary sources of arsenic,[5]

according to the Food and Drug Administration, arsenic compounds are extensively

added to the feed of animals—particularly chickens and pigs—to make them grow

faster.[6] The animals Americans eat are so heavily infested with internal

parasites that adding arsenic to the feed can result in a “stunning” increase in

growth rates.[7]

According to Dr. Ellen Silbergeld, a researcher from the Johns Hopkins School

of Public Health, the poultry industry’s practice of using arsenic compounds in

its feed is something that has not been studied: “It’s an issue everybody is

trying to pretend doesn’t exist.”[8] “Arsenic acted as a growth stimulant in

chickens—develops the meat faster—and since then, the poultry industry has gone

wild using this ingredient,” says Donald Herman, a Mississippi agricultural

consultant and former Environmental Protection Agency researcher who has studied

this use of arsenic for a decade. “And they’ve tried everything to refrain it

from becoming public knowledge.”[9]

The poultry industry argues that the organic form of arsenic given to chickens

isn’t toxic.[10] “This study appears to be much ado about nothing,” says Richard

Lobb, the public relations director of the industry organization National

Chicken Council. He asserts that the less toxic form of arsenic is “used

responsibly and safely by poultry producers.”[11] Contrary to Mr. Lobb’s claims,

the researchers found not only elevated levels of organic arsenic in chicken

meat, but elevated levels of the highly toxic inorganic form typically used only

in insecticides and weed killers.[12] And cooking the muscles of these animals

may create additional toxic arsenic by-products.[13]

Inorganic arsenic is considered one of the prominent environmental causes of

cancer mortality in the world.[14] Arsenic is a human carcinogen linked to

liver, lung, skin, kidney, bladder, and prostate cancers. It can also cause

neurological, cardiovascular, gastrointestinal, and immune system abnormalities.

Diabetes has also been linked to arsenic exposure.[15]

The feeding of arsenic to chickens in the United States releases hundreds of

tons of arsenic into the environment every year in the form of poultry manure,

which is spread on fields as fertilizer.[16] In fact, there’s currently a

coalition of families suffering serious health conditions suing chicken

producers like Tyson after research showed cancer rates as much as 50 times

above the national average in communities neighboring factory farm poultry

operations.

The February 2004 Medical Letter on the Centers for Disease Control and the

Food and Drug Administration concludes: ”Chicken consumption may contribute

significant amounts of arsenic to total arsenic exposure of the U.S.

population….” Levels of arsenic in chicken are so high that other sources may

have to be monitored carefully to prevent undue toxic exposure among the

population.[17]

Citations

 

Environmental Health Perspectives 112 (2004): 18.

One KFC bucket contains 3 legs, 3 breasts, 3 wings, and 3 thighs

[http://cspinet.org/new/pdf/letter_to_ftc.pdf] weighing a total of 1,176 grams

[http://www.yum.com/nutrition/documents/kfc_nutrition.pdf] and containing up to

108.5 micrograms of inorganic arsenic [Environmental Health Perspectives 112

(2004): 18] exceeding the EPA limit on an 8 ounce glass of water by a factor of

48.4 [EPA 815-Z-01-001].

Momplaisir GM, Rosal CG, and Heithmar EM, “Arsenic Speciation Methods for

Studying the Environmental Fate of Organoarsenic Animal-Feed Additives,” U.S.

EPA, NERL-Las Vegas, 2001; (TIM No. 01-11).

Medical Letter on the Centers for Disease Control and Food and Drug

Administration, February 1, 2004.

Momplaisir GM, Rosa CG, and Heithmar EM, “Arsenic Speciation Methods for

Studying the Environmental Fate of Organoarsenic Animal-Feed Additives,” U.S.

EPA, NERL-Las Vegas, 2001; (TIM No. 01-11).

Ibid.

Texas Lawyer, January 23, 1995.

Vandiver J, " Chicken Feed, " Daily Times (Salisbury, Md.), January 4, 2004.

Texas Lawyer, January 23, 1995.

Health Day News, January 19, 2004.

Environmental Health Perspectives 112 (2004): 18.

Hanaoka K, Goessler W, Ohno H, Irgolic KJ, and Kaise T, “Formation of Toxic

Arsenical in Roasted Muscles of Marine Animals,” Appl Organometal Chem, 15

(2001): 61-6.

Smith AH, Hopenhayn-Rich C, Bates ML, et al., “Cancer Risks from Arsenic in

Drinking Water,” Environmental Health Perspectives 97 (1992), 259-67.

Momplaisir GM, Rosal CG, and Heithmar EM, “Arsenic Speciation Methods for

Studying the Environmental Fate of Organoarsenic Animal-Feed Additives,” U.S.

EPA, NERL-Las Vegas, 2001; (TIM No. 01-11).

Ibid.

Medical Letter on the Centers for Disease Control and Food and Drug

Administration, February 1, 2004.

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(813) 774-2840

 

" I am in favor of animal rights as well as human rights. That is the way of

the whole human being " . ~Abraham Lincoln

 

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