Study: Organic Chicken Carries Significantly Lower Salmonella Risk

By Tom Philpott

For related articles and more information, please visit OCA's All About Organics page, Food Safety page, and our Factory Farm page.

This study from the University of Georgia's Center for Food Safety came out in November and has bounced around the internet, but for some reason I'm just now noticing it. It's worth a look.

The researchers looked at broilers -- chickens raised for meat -- from "three organic and four conventional broiler farms from the same company in North Carolina," and tested their manure for salmonella. They also tested samples of their feed.

Here's what they found: 38.8 percent of the conventional birds were carrying salmonella, versus 5.6 percent for the organic birds. As for feed, 27.5 percent of the conventional feed samples were carrying the pathogen, versus 5 percent of the organic. Recall that in the vast salmonella-egg recall of last year, authorities homed in on tainted feed as the likely source of contamination.

Now for the creepy part: 39.7 percent of the salmonella found in the conventional birds had resistance to no fewer than six different antibiotics. None of the salmonella from the organic birds showed antibiotic resistance. 

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State Study: Low Levels of Perchlorate Affect Infants

A new analysis by state scientists found that low levels of a rocket fuel chemical common in Inland drinking water supplies appear to be more harmful to newborn babies than previously believed, prompting calls for a tougher limit for tap water.

Scientists with the Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment examined records of blood samples drawn from the heels of 497,458 newborns in 1998 as part of a California disease-screening program.

The researchers found that the babies born in areas where tap water was contaminated with perchlorate -- including babies in Riverside and San Bernardino -- had a 50 percent chance of having a poorly performing thyroid gland, said Dr. Craig Steinmaus, lead author of the study published in this month's Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine.

Though perchlorate is in many Inland groundwater supplies, water providers aggressively treat and blend water to meet the state standard for the pollutant. The study's authors, however, said they saw thyroid issues in babies born in areas where tap water met the current state standard.

The finding is important because the thyroid, a butterfly-shaped gland in the throat, produces the hormones fetus and babies need for proper nerve and brain development. Other studies have found that small declines in the production of thyroid hormone may negatively affect intelligence, Steinmaus said. 

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