Supermarkets reveal amount of antibiotics in their meat

THREE major supermarkets yesterday became the first to spell out the amount of antibiotics used in their products.

Other chains immediately came under pressure to follow suit. Campaigners say overusing the drugs threatens human health as germs develop resistance to treatment and can become ‘superbugs’.

Marks & Spencer, Waitrose and Asda published figures itemising the amount of antibiotics used by farms in producing beef, pork and chicken for their stores.

Asda said its chicken used 7.7mg of antibiotics per kilo – well below the industry target of 25mg set by the Responsible Use of Medicines in Agriculture Alliance. And its beef cattle had 7.4mg per kilo, below the national target of 10mg by 2020.

M&S figures showed its use of the antimicrobial drugs was 90 per cent below the target. The M&S data covered only pig, chicken and dairy farming, but showed their pig and chicken farmers were using less than one quarter of UK averages.

Waitrose’s data was more comprehensive, covering beef cattle, lamb, turkeys, ducks, egg production and farmed fish. Its pig and chicken suppliers used about a third or less of industry averages, and use in turkeys was about a sixth of average.

Coilin Nunan, scientific adviser to the Alliance to Save Our Antibiotics, said: ‘We very much welcome [the supermarkets’] decisions to publish data on their suppliers’ antibiotic use. We want to see all supermarkets increase transparency for consumers by publishing similar data.’