‘Big Chicken’ chronicles the public health dangers of using antibiotics in farming
Efforts to raise bigger birds unwittingly spawned drug resistance in bacteria
COOPED UP Thanks in large part to antibiotics, chicken production has become heavily industrialized, as detailed in a new book.
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Big Chicken
Maryn McKenna
National Geographic, $27
Journalist Maryn McKenna opens Big Chicken by teasing our taste buds with a description of the succulent roasted chickens she bought at an open-air market in Paris. The birds tasted nothing like the bland, uniform chicken offered at U.S. grocery stores. This meat had an earthy, lush, animal flavor. From this tantalizing oh-so-European tableau, McKenna hits us with a sickening contrast — scientists chasing outbreaks of drug-resistant Salmonella infections in humans, and ailing chickens living in crowded conditions and never seeing the light of day.
Antibiotics are at the root of both nightmares, McKenna argues.
