Maryn McKenna, at “Superbug”, her Wired blog: “To Slow Down Drug Resistance in Health Care, Buy an Antibiotic-Free Turkey for Thanksgiving“:
… How can healthcare workers contribute to slowing down antibiotic resistance? A healthcare nonprofit suggests they commit to buying an antibiotic-free turkey for Thanksgiving…
Here’s the backdrop to the campaign, created by Health Care Without Harm,the Sharing Antimicrobial Reports for Pediatric Stewardship (SHARPS) collaborative, and the Pediatric Infectious Disease Society (PIDS):
Health Care Without Harm takes seriously the injunction in the Hippocratic Oath — “first, do no harm” — and works to improve the industry’s impact on patients, workers and the environment. Among other things, the group has encouraged large healthcare organizations to use their institutional food-purchasing power to support production of sustainable meat and produce. Recently, they have been encouraging hospitals to commit to buying meat from animals raised without the routine use of antibiotics, and a lot of hospital systems have signed on.
Their new pledge asks health care workers to make the problem personal, by choosing an antibiotic-free turkey for Thanksgiving — arguably the meat-animal purchase that gets the most attention out of all the holiday meals in the year…
More details at the link.