Poultry: Pure and Simple

We Americans love our chicken! On average, each of us eat some 57 pounds of it a year, along with 14 pounds of turkey. That’s a lot of bird!  So now we know what we're eating, but do we know what they're eating? And in what conditions they’re raised?

Maybe we'd rather not know….even though what we don't know could hurt us. Many scientists, farmers and food analysts are sounding the alarm about the conditions in which we raise these hundreds of millions of birds each year. These overcrowded  birds are fed so many antibiotics to prevent disease that we're undermining the effectiveness of these same drugs to combat infections in ourselves.   That’s because the few germs that survive these antibiotics go on to become super-bugs, immune to our newest medicines.

There are other ways to raise meat.  Today on A World of Possibilities, “Poultry Pure and Simple.” We’ll hear from turkeys, chickens and the farmers who raise them --as their grandparents did-- free-range and free of antibiotics, growth hormones and other additives. We'll also hear from a supplier of sustainably raised meat --- and the founder of a fast food chain that serves only the real deal and finds many customers ready to pay a premium to taste the difference.

This program was funded by The Pew Charitable Trusts.