In the U.S., we offer healthcare and retirement benefits, as well as paid time off and parental leave, to Corporate Staff and Company-owned restaurant employees working more than a certain number of hours or, for paid parental leave, based on position. Using rigorous nutrition criteria grounded in science and nutrition policy, by the end of 2022, at least 50 percent or more of the Happy Meals listed on menus (restaurant menu boards, primary ordering screen of kiosks and owned mobile ordering applications) in each market will meet McDonald's new Global Happy Meal. McDonald’s action on antibiotics fits with the company’s commitment to use its size for good, though the burger chain needed some persuading. In 2015, the Student PIRGs working with U.S. PIRG Education Fund and the Antibiotics off the Menu coalition started to push McDonald’s to phase routine antibiotic use out of its meat supply chain. Shortly afterward, McDonald’s took an important step forward, transitioning away from purchasing chicken raised on medically-important antibiotics. In August 2017, McDonald’s released a new Vision for Antimicrobial Stewardship, which included important objectives, such as cutting routine antibiotic use from its entire meat supply. However, the company did not attach any timeline for making that vision a reality.
“It’s great that McDonald’s is joining the effort to stop wasting life-saving antibiotics on healthy livestock, so that we can preserve them for patients who need them,” said Brad Spellberg MD, Chief Medical Officer, LAC+USC Medical Center (opinion expressed is Dr. Spellberg’s, not that of LAC+USC Medical Center)