Wanted: Antibiotic-Free Chicken

by Susanne Retka Schill (Ethanol Producer Magazine) Consumer-driven changes peck their way up the food chain to distillers grains producers. ... The move to minimize or eliminate nontherapeutic use of antibiotics in meat production is a response to the increasing concerns about drug resistant bacteria affecting people. Drug resistance in tuberculosis cases and antibiotic-resistant staph bacteria (MRSA) are two that receive a lot of attention these days.

It is far from a new issue, however. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration first proposed restricting the use of antibiotics in feed in the mid-1980s, when producers were increasingly using them as growth enhancers and preventative aids in confinement feed operations.

The feed industry is getting on board, agreeing to move toward reserving certain antibiotics for use under a veterinarian’s supervision to treat animal illnesses.

The impact on the ethanol industry could be significant. The industry has long used low doses of antibiotics in propagation and fermentation tanks to keep yield-reducing bacteria counts at low levels. A full-blown bacterial infection is a serious issue that can halt production. The miles of pipes, hundreds of valves and dozens of tanks in an ethanol plant provide multiple places for bacteria to hide and proliferate. As a result, sanitation procedures have become much more sophisticated, with clean in place (CIP) systems now commonly used and close monitoring of infection indicators standard operating procedure. Nonetheless, some estimates say 70 percent or more of U.S. ethanol producers still routinely rely upon antibiotics.

The likelihood of problematic antibiotic residues getting into the final distillers grains product is low, according to research conducted at the University of Minnesota.

While the science is indicating the risk for antibiotics in distillers grains is low, Shurson (Jerry Shurson, professor of swine nutrition and a known expert on distillers grains) told his listeners in Bangkok that the science is backed by experience. There are two sensitive markets in the U.S—dairy and laying hens—where the milk and egg products are closely monitored and tolerances for antibiotic residues are quite strict. “If there were a problem with residues, they wouldn’t use distillers,” Shurson says, “and that’s not the case.”

Dennis Bayrock, research director for PhibroChem Ethanol Performance Group, reinforces the case that little antibiotic residue is found in distillers grains. More than 300 samples were tested by Phibro without any detection of virginiamycin residues above limits, Bayrock says, and other studies have reaffirmed levels of virginiamycin in samples below the detection limit. Virginiamycin is the most widely used, although not the only, antibiotic in the ethanol industry.

A focus on minute antibiotic residues could be misplaced, Bayrock suggests. For one, while antibiotics and other chemicals can be detected in extremely low amounts, he says, a zero tolerance approach is not practical. “A subtler point that most people don’t realize is that the clinical bacteria that do or do not show resistance in human medicine are just not isolated to any significant levels in an industrial ethanol plant,” he says. While some studies have isolated E coli in stored grain and soil at facilities the bacteria are likely destroyed as processing begins, as they are not found in plant microbiological audits, he adds. Furthermore, there is no virginiamycin-related human drug approved for any serious and unique human disease.

The industry’s approach has matured, he says. The team with Phibro Ethanol Performance Group helps ethanol producers fine tune the process to minimize upsets. “Putting good practices and CIP practices and auditing at a plant comes first,” he explains. Procedures are audited and yeast health and microbiology are monitored. “The philosophy I train our field staff in is to look at process first, help the plant, and then use our products with what contamination is remaining. In the old school way of thinking, they’d say: ‘if 2 parts per million [of antibiotics] worked, let’s throw some more in; if it worked over here it should work over there.’ We have moved away from this trial-and-error thinking. We make sure everything is working correctly, and then use our products when necessary.”

Regulatory changes coming in the Food Safety Modernization Act are expected to require all plants to better understand potential hazards and upgrade their procedures in handling all inputs—chemicals, antibiotics and even incoming corn. READ MORE