February 8, 2008

 

Poultry feed additive arsenic may pose grave health risks

 

 

Chicken feed additive containing arsenic which is used to produce pinker, healthier, bigger-breasted birds could cause human disease, according to a study headed by a Duquesne University researcher.

The research is the first study to link feed additive to human health. Arsenic has been widely used since the 1960s by commercial chicken producers to control intestinal parasites, reduce stress, stimulate growth and improve the color of chicken meat.

Dr. Partha Basu, the study's lead author and associate professor in Duquesne's Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, said laboratory analysis reveals that the antibiotic arsenic compound roxarsone, which promotes the growth of blood vessels in chickens to produce pinker meat, does the same in human cell lines¡ªa critical first step in many human diseases, including cancer.

Dr. Basu, who also worked on the study with scientists from Thermo Fisher Scientific laboratories and the University of Pittsburgh's Department of Environmental and Occupational Health, said this finding is "significant as it relates to human health effects from roxarsone".

The researcher also said roxarsone, which increases pigmentation by forming more blood vessels in chickens, does the same in humans. This process is called angiogenesis, a common growth process, but also one that occurs in many diseases and cancers.

Results of the study have been published in Environmental Health Perspectives, an online journal of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, which supported the study.

Although the effect of roxarsone on those who eat chicken is still uncertain, Dr. Basu said, poultry workers are likely at risk because they could inhale dust containing arsenic from feed and waste. In addition, those who work with or use commercial fertilizers containing waste from chickens that were fed the arsenic additive could also be exposed by breathing the dust.

The National Chicken Council, a Washington, D.C.-based trade organization for the poultry industry, said it wasn't aware of the study but maintained that roxarsone is safe and is approved by the Food and Drug Administration.

Richard Lobb, a spokesman for the council, said the study was based on laboratory tests and not on reports of actual illnesses. He said the research should need further study to be confirmed by other researchers.

Alpharma Inc., the global specialty pharmaceutical company that makes roxarsone, declined to comment.

US chicken producers use a total of 2.2 million pounds of roxarsone each year and about 70 percent of the 9 billion fryer chickens grown annually nationwide eat feed containing the additive, which also is used in turkey and pig feed.

More than 95 percent of the roxarsone fed to chickens is excreted unchanged in chicken waste, which is regularly applied as fertilizer on surrounding farm fields or used in commercial fertilizers. The arsenic from those applications could leach into surface and ground water supplies.

The new study is a follow-up to one released by Dr. Basu and other Duquesne University researchers in March last year that found the organic arsenic feed additive is chemically transformed into inorganic arsenic, a known carcinogen, much more quickly than previously thought.

Arsenic occurs naturally in the environment, but industrial discharges by coal-burning power plants, industries and some mining operations are closely regulated. Its use in pesticides and as a wood preservative has been banned due to health concerns and the difficulty in removing it from the environment.

Chronic exposure to inorganic arsenic is known to cause cancer and has been linked to heart disease, diabetes and declines in brain functions.

Other studies have found the arsenic feed additive in dust inside rural homes near chicken farms and in ground water.

The study doesn't focus on the risks of eating chickens that were fed roxarsone, but Dr. Basu said there are reasons to be cautious. Based on a study conducted in 2006 by the University of Minnesota, Dr Basu fast food chicken in California and Minnesota were found to have high levels of arsenic. 

The European Union has already banned the use of roxarsone in 1999.

Scott Sechler, Pennsylvania's biggest chicken producer, sells a million birds a week and doesn't use roxarsone or any other arsenic additive. He markets his birds under the Farmers Pride and Bell & Evans labels, carried in Western Pennsylvania by Whole Foods and Giant Eagle.

Tyson Foods, the nation's second biggest chicken producer stopped using arsenic additives in July 2004, and Perdue Farms, the nation's fifth biggest, stopped in April 2007.