If you’re buying a pack of ground turkey in the meat aisle, you might already know what to check for: Meat that’s priced well, looks fresh and isn’t past its expiration date. But what you might not consider are that these turkeys may have consumed antibiotics and that this could affect you.
Excess use of antibiotics in livestock — and in humans — fuels antibiotic resistance: the process by which bacteria evolve to outsmart our best weapons against them. These bacteria are sometimes known as superbugs, which, despite their sci-fi nickname, are a very real threat to human health.
These bacteria can spread to humans from animals and cause illnesses that become increasingly hard to treat over time. According to a review study from 2017, drug-resistant infections kill 23,000 Americans each year — and society's antibiotic practices are largely to blame.
