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Shake Shack, BurgerFi get ‘A’ for antibiotic beef practices

October 17, 2018

Shake Shack and Burger Fi lead the pack when it comes to serving beef raised without antibiotics and are the only two restaurants to earn top honors in the fourth annual Chain Reaction scorecard on antibiotics policies and practices.

A good majority, 22 of 25, of hamburger chains, including McDonald's, scored an F grade due to not having policies restricting antibiotic use in the beef supply chain, according to a press release.

"There’s nothing more American than a hamburger. But for the sake of our health, we need influential restaurants such as McDonald’s to take a bite out of antibiotic overuse in the beef industry," said Matt Wellington, U.S. PIRG Education Fund’s Antibiotics program director, in the release. "Restaurants need to demand antibiotic restrictions from their beef suppliers. We simply cannot afford to lose lifesaving medicines to produce a slightly cheaper burger."

The report notes that McDonald's has declared a strategy for antibiotic stewardship, but has no timeline yet in place, and the same is true for In-N-Out Burger.

According to the release, overuse of antibiotics on livestock hastens the spread of antibiotic resistance in bacteria and increases the risk of drug-resistant infections in people.