McDonald’s expands its move away from antibiotics in poultry

McDonald’s said Wednesday that it is broadening its move away from serving chicken fed with certain antibiotics.

The fast-food company said it will no longer buy chicken raised in other countries that has been treated with antibiotics also used by humans and deemed important to fighting serious infection. Two years ago, McDonald’s announced a similar policy for its U.S. suppliers.

Routinely feeding antibiotics to animals raised for food has been linked to the surge in resistant strains of bacteria that cause serious human illnesses and are responsible for about 23,000 deaths annually and $20 billion in health care costs, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Under the new plan, McDonalds will stop purchasing poultry treated with a small number of antibiotics that the World Health Association has said often are the only drugs available to fight serious infections in humans.

McDonald’s said it will gradually expand the policy over the next decade to include other drugs and other animal products, including beef and pork.

The transition will begin next year with chicken purchased in Brazil, Canada, Japan, South Korea and Europe, and expand the following year to Australia and Russia, the company said. A first-year exception for one type of antibiotic used by European suppliers also will be eliminated by the second year, the company said.

Food and health advocates praised the plan.

Jean Halloran, director of Food Policy Initiatives at Consumers Union, said the policy shift “could be a total game changer that could transform the marketplace given the company’s massive buying power.” McDonald’s had revenue of $24.6 billion in 2016.