Of Chickens and Life

Department of Environmental Health Sciences

Ellen Silbergeld never imagined that she would be spending a good amount of time with chickens. But for nearly a decade, Silbergeld has become quite familiar with the industrial poultry production farms in the mid-Atlantic region of the U.S. Her research into the health and environmental effects stemming from these operations, which house as many as 75,000 birds in a single facility, has earned her an international reputation as an expert on industrial agriculture’s role in the rise of drug-resistant bacterial infections. “When I first heard about this, I was frankly astounded that anyone would permit the use of antibiotic drugs as feed additives,” she says. Silbergeld and her doctoral students in recent years have linked antibiotic use in poultry production to antibiotic-resistant bacteria in farm workers, and air and surface water in nearby communities. Her latest findings demonstrate that the flies buzzing around poultry houses by the thousands can carry drug-resistant pathogens that originate from poultry waste and poultry houses. “I think it’s clear that this is another mode of transport [for antibiotic-resistant bacteria],” Silbergeld says. Her team’s studies are frequently cited in the U.S. policy debate on restricting the use of antimicrobials in animal feeds and reforming food animal production.