Is responsible antibiotic use in poultry viable?

Poultry producers are all too familiar with non-governmental organizations asking them for the moon in cost-raising initiatives for doing ‘good’ but which if adopted would drive poultry prices higher. Now come two public charities with a plan for reducing antibiotic use in poultry while moderating the resulting price increases.

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Schools in the U.S. spend $1 billion dollars on chicken every year. Many purchasing directors have a strong commitment to responsible use, or no use, of antibiotics. | School Food Focus
Schools in the U.S. spend $1 billion dollars on chicken every year. Many purchasing directors have a strong commitment to responsible use, or no use, of antibiotics. | School Food Focus

Poultry producers are all too familiar with non-governmental organizations asking them for the moon in cost-raising initiatives for doing "good" but, if adopted, these initiatives would drive poultry prices higher. Now come two public charities with a plan for reducing antibiotic use in poultry while moderating the resulting price increases.

School Food Focus and Pew Charitable Trusts in 2015 developed the Certified Responsible Antibiotic Use Standard (CRAU) to minimize the use of antibiotics in poultry production and offer schools a more economical way to put that poultry on the menu.

CRAU-seal

CRAU is based on the ‘judicious use’ principles of practice that were developed by FDA in cooperation with the American Veterinary Medical Association.

Under the CRAU standard, the therapeutic use of antibiotics with analogues in human medicine must be rare, well documented and prescribed by a veterinarian. No administration of antibiotics is permitted pre-hatch, and non-therapeutic use of antibiotics is disallowed.

Poultry produced under CRAU is “better chicken in terms of antibiotic use”(using less antibiotics) than conventional chicken, according to the charities, and, by their reckoning, less expensive to produce and lower in price than NAE poultry.

Tyson Foods and Perdue Farms now participate in CRAU auditing and certification for certain parts of their production. Tyson, the largest provider of chicken to the PK-12 school food market, provides roughly three-quarters of its offering for schools under the CRAU program. Perdue Farms has adopted CRAU auditing and certification (side by side with NAE programs) in eight complexes.

Certified Responsible Antibiotic Use: Alternative to NAE

Speaking at the 2016 National Chicken Council Chicken Marketing Summit, Pew’s Karin Hoelzer said, “A lot of school districts want to serve chicken that is raised responsibly with less antibiotics but they cannot afford NAE chicken. The CRAU standard was developed for school districts and other purchasers who want to do the right thing concerning antibiotic policy but cannot afford NAE chicken.”

Many school foodservice purchasing directors have a strong commitment to responsible use, or no use, of antibiotics, with schools in the U.S. spending around $1 billion dollars on chicken every year. School Food Focus reports that around 80 percent of the school districts surveyed last year purchased chicken with an antibiotics claim.

Tyson, the largest provider of chicken to the PK-12 school food market, provides roughly three-quarters of its offering for schools under the CRAU program.

As big as the school foodservice market is, a potentially greater question is whether poultry producers, their customers and consumers would embrace certified responsible use as an alternative to NAE at retail. Dr. Hoelzer, in fact, told listeners at the Chicken Marketing Summit that their aim is to develop similar programs for poultry sold in retail markets and for other animal proteins such as pork.

Certified Responsible Antibiotic Use Standard

In addition to ‘judicious use’ principles of practice developed by FDA in cooperation with the American Veterinary Medical Association, the CRAU standard requires the following:

  1. Medically important antibiotics are used only if prescribed by a licensed veterinarian.
  2. A written veterinary report to School Food Focus is required whenever antibiotics are used for more than two consecutive growing cycles. This report must describe the underlying problem(s) and outline a plan of action to correct it if not already resolved. If the problem is not resolved, the site is no longer CRAU approved and will be removed from the Focus and USDA official listing of approved programs.
  3. Growers will maintain records of all feed and water additives for each growing cycle for the most current two years.
  4. Regular third party verification of antibiotic use documentation and onsite practices by USDA is required.
  5. No antibiotics allowed pre-hatch.
  6. A list of the classes of antibiotics with analogues in human medicine is included in the CRAU Audit guidance documents.
  7. The terms “therapeutic and non-therapeutic” are specifically defined in the CRAU standard.

CRAU’s advantages for poultry producers

Hoelzer offered an assessment of the relative merits of CRAU and NAE in a recent article, “What is responsible antibiotic use—and why does it matter?”:

“On its face, the idea behind the “no antibiotics ever” (NAE) and “raised without antibiotics” labels seems simple: Meat and poultry in those packages comes from animals raised without the use of these drugs. NAE is one of several ways to reduce antibiotic use. However, transitioning from conventional livestock production to NAE can take years, requiring continuous refinement of management practices as well as major investments, such as modifications to animal housing. Even once NAE policies are established, day-to-day operations can be challenging for producers. For example, when animals do get sick and require treatment with antibiotics, meat from those animals no longer qualifies as NAE and must be sold under another label.”

Speaking at the Chicken Marketing Summit, Hoelzer said, “What the CRAU standard means for poultry producers is that they can treat their animals if they are sick. And it means that they don’t have to divert treated birds to a secondary market. That may or may not be a big issue depending on their customers, but it can be a really important thing to some producers.”

Confusing array of standards for antibiotic use

Programs for producing poultry with less or no antibiotics may, or may not, involve third-party verification, according to Hoelzer, and include the following:

  • Raised without antibiotics
  • No medically important antibiotics
  • Judicious use
  • No antibiotics ever
  • Organic
  • No antibiotics for growth promotion
  • Antibiotic free
  • No routine antibiotics

“Antibiotic policies are confusing!” Hoelzer said. “Particularly for customers who want to make informed decisions about antibiotic policies, it is becoming confusing and complex.”

Transparency, she said, is essential in communicating with customers and consumers about antibiotic usage. The CRAU standard, she noted, is conducted under the USDA’s Process Verified Program (PVP), which provides verification by the Agricultural Marketing Service that production processes support the standard.

Perdue Farms has adopted CRAU auditing and certification (side by side with NAE programs) in eight of its chicken complexes.

“The CRAU program is described in plain language. Customers understand what the program means; they don’t have to have an animal science background to know what it means. The responsibility is clear cut. The veterinarian takes responsibility not just for treating the sick animals but for managing the health of the flock. There are provisions in the standard that if antibiotic treatments are necessary the veterinarian has to assess why the treatments are needed and decide what else can be done to prevent this need from occurring going forward,” she said.

Is "responsible use" too hard to message?

“Is the responsible use concept of antibiotics usage marketable?” Hoelzer asked listeners at the Chicken Marketing Summit. Some poultry producers at the meeting, in fact, expressed doubt about the feasibility of charging significant premiums for poultry produced under a responsible antibiotics use program. Perhaps their more immediate doubt was about whether ‘responsible use’-produced poultry can successfully compete with NAE poultry in the market segments in which antibiotics usage is a product differentiator.

Commonsense and responsible antibiotics use

Kathy Lawrence, co-founder and senior director of School Food Focus, acknowledged the messaging for NAE is clear and easy, but in an interview with WATT PoultryUSA said that practicality, commonsense and transparency can persuade customers and consumers to accept responsible antibiotics use.

“We have antibiotics and we ought to be using them for the right reasons, whether in human medicine or in animal agriculture. Building animal production systems on the daily use of medically important antibiotics is not a good idea. But preserving those antibiotics for when they are most needed is absolutely right,” she said.

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The use of medically important antibiotics for disease prevention is disallowed under CRAU.  

As far as the messaging is concerned, Lawrence added, “I think we are going to see a better understanding that NAE is a great standard if the poultry producer can achieve it at an affordable cost, but it requires diverting a portion of production to a secondary market. And the efficacy of antibiotics must also be protected for the production of that secondary stream of products.”

She concluded, “I don’t see NAE becoming the sole standard for poultry production in the United States, if poultry is to continue being the ‘go to’ protein for most American families.”

Lawrence stressed the need for transparency and third-party certification, saying that whatever standards are adopted the need for accountability is imperative with the public.

Commercial practice and sustainability

Beyond the considerations of cost of production, pricing and market acceptance, there is a powerful argument in favor of a ‘responsible antibiotics use’ program: Antibiotics are available for disease treatment and control in poultry – and with no need for a secondary market.

 

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Chef Ann Cooper messages the CRAU. View the video here: https://goo.gl/hfZHT0.

 

A listing of major food companies with antibiotic use claims, https://goo.gl/j2yHyJ

 

What is therapeutic use?

Therapeutic use under CRAU refers to the use of antibiotics that are identical or very closely related to drugs used in human medicine under the following circumstances:

  • Poultry have been diagnosed with bacterial disease.
  • Poultry are healthy but have been exposed to infectious bacteria before the onset of clinical signs or if there is a medical reason to believe the birds are at significantly increased risk for developing a clinical bacterial infection.
  • The administration of the antibiotics must be in in a valid veterinarian-client-patient relationship.

Non-therapeutic use of antibiotics (including for growth promotion, feed efficiency, weight gain, or in the absence of documented disease exposure) with analogues in human medicine is disallowed.

The use of drugs with no analogues in human medicine – aminocoumarins, glycolipids, ionophores and quinoxalines – is allowed.

 

 

USDA’s Process Verified Program

In addition to the CRAU programs of Tyson Foods and Perdue Farms, other Process Verified Programs include Perdue Farms brand cage free, tenderness guaranteed, no antibiotics ever, vegetarian fed, no animal byproduct fed chicken; Cargill’s Shady Brook brand “No antibiotics used for growth promotion – antibiotics only used for treatment and prevention of illness” turkey; and Tyson Foods’ no antibiotics ever chicken.

 

 

"Judicious use" principles

CRAU is based on the following ‘judicious use’ principles of practice that were developed by FDA in cooperation with the American Veterinary Medical Association:

  • Emphasis on sound preventative programs, including vaccination and blood testing
  • Documented need for antibiotics and demonstration that no viable alternatives exist
  • Veterinarians consulted prior to the use of antibiotics
  • Records kept of treatment and outcome
  • Treatment for grouped animals is done at barn/house level. Animals in adjacent housing should not be treated if not exposed
  • Environmental contamination is minimized

 

Read more:

Why responsible antibiotics use is worth it, www.WATTAgNet.com/articles/27544

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