eat less meat: is chicken a healthy alternative to red meat?
Health studies linking the consumption of meat with various diseases – from cancer to heart disease to diabetes – seem to appear in the media on an almost weekly basis. They usually focus on the dangers of red meat and often recommend that people eat chicken instead.
But is chicken really a better alternative? In fact, poultry consumption comes with its own health concerns, not to mention a host of ethical issues relating to the environment and animal welfare.
Chicken, long touted as a lean, low-fat alternative to beef, now turns out be a lot chubbier that it used to be.
British researchers at London Metropolitan University found that in 1970 a chicken contained 8.6 grams of fat per 100 grams, compared with 22.8 grams in a supermarket bird in 2004. Over the same period, the amount of protein fell by more than 30 per cent from 24.3 grams per 100 grams to 16.5. For the first time since records began in 1870, a typical chicken now has more fat than protein.
Professor Michael Crawford, who led the research team said, “The public thinks of chickens as lean products and a much healthier alternative to red meat. But we found that typical supermarket chickens are very fatty.”
The reason, say the researchers, is mainly intensive poultry farming. The idleness imposed by factory farming and modern feeds are producing obese birds. They just can’t move around much. American scientists at the Agriculture Research Service (ARS) found the same problem. The ARS reported that “modern broiler/breeder chickens don’t adequately balance their feed consumption to match their energy requirements.”
