Here are some amazing health benefits of eating chicken
1# Helps build muscles: Chicken is one of the best non-vegetarian sources of protein. It is lean meat, which means that it contains more amount of proteins and less amount of fat. A 100g serving of roasted chicken offers you 27g of protein, making it great for those who want to bulk up and build muscles.
2# Keeps your bones healthy: Apart from protein, chicken is rich in several minerals like phosphorus and calcium, that helps keeps bones in mint condition. Also, it has selenium which has been known to cut risk of arthritis.
3# Relieves stress: Chicken has two nutrients that are great for reducing stress tryptophan and Vitamin B5. Both of them have a calming effect on your body and this makes chicken an excellent option after a stressful day. Also, it tastes great and that too adds to its stress releasing, happiness inducing properties.
4# Reduces PMS symptoms: Magnesium, a nutrient present in chicken helps soothe symptoms of pre-menstrual syndrome and fight the various mood changes that a woman might experience during her periods.
5# Helps boost testosterone levels: Men should consume foods rich in zinc as it helps regulate testosterone levels as well as boost sperm production.
6# Boosts immunity: Chicken soup has long been used as a home remedy for relieving cold, flu and other common respiratory infections. The hot steam of chicken soup helps clear nasal and throat congestion while the thick fluid coats the throat to prevent invasion of respiratory linings by microbes to cause infection. A study evaluating this effect suggested that chicken soup inhibits migration of neutrophils, a type of immune cells, thereby preventing inflammation during common infections and boosting immunity.
7# Promotes heart health: Chicken, being rich in vitamin B6, plays an important role in preventing heart attack. Vitamin B6 helps by lowering the levels of homocysteine, one of the key components linked to an increased risk of heart attack.
Heated debates have been taking place on various forums revolving around the topic of hormones being used in chicken production. What has led to this sudden suspicion though? Is it because people have become more health conscious or have they suddenly realised chickens have become bigger? These beliefs stem from a lack of knowledge and inaccurate information being passed around and everyone conveniently links it to the rapid growth of broiler chickens (domesticated fowl, bred and raised specifically for meat production).
Why have chickens increased in size over the years?
To begin with, the rapid growth rate of chickens (5.7 lb in six weeks) is not the result of a single experimental manipulation within a span of a few months; rather it is the result of an on-going research (in terms of selection and breeding) dating back to 1925.
During that point in time, the market age of broiler chickens was 16 weeks with 2.2 lb body weight. This breeding plan of broiler chickens depicts intense selection for choosing a bird to breed the next generation. Only 10 were selected from a group of 100 keeping in mind body weight, feed conversion and vigour. If that isn’t selective, then I don’t know what is. This particular intensive selection resulted in better offspring as compared to previous offspring. This method isn’t unique to chickens – it is used for other animals as well.
Is injecting hormones into chickens necessary?
Moreover, the basic question that should be asked is if hormones are needed at all. The answer is no, since birds are already on the edge of their physiological limits and the added use of supplements may have disastrous effects on the bird.
Another misconception people have is the administration of hormones through feed or water. That is not practiced as such because digestion of birds starts with the action of acids and enzymes combining, which then convert into basic amino acids and naturally destroy the function of hormones.
The only possible way for hormones to work is to inject chickens on a daily basis, because the natural growth hormone in chickens is pulsatile and peaking every 90 minutes. Frequent injection of hormones is not possible in commercial poultry due to the higher number of chickens, therefore the probability of this happening on commercial farms is nil.
Lastly, hormone feeding is not cost effective since there is no commercial production of chicken hormones and even if it were to be available, administrating it to broiler chickens will cost more than the cost of broilers itself.
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