Antibiotics In Ag Essential

Antibiotics in agriculture are essential for animal and human health
By Peter Silley, professor of applied microbiology at the University of Bradford - 07/13/10 02:06 PM ET

Antibiotic resistance is a significant global public-health challenge that has created an emotional public response among critics, public-health experts, and animal-health advocates. It involves debate over antibiotic use in both humans and animals, and demands improved monitoring and surveillance, more research and, ultimately, the development of a range of tools that will help reduce reliance on antibiotics. This week’s Energy and Commerce Committee hearing, “Antibiotic Resistance and the Use of Antibiotics in Animal Agriculture,” will further examine how these products are used in agriculture and their impact on human health.

The emotional rhetoric surrounding this issue has resulted in knee-jerk legislative proposals to ban certain uses of antibiotics. Blunt policy instruments could be harmful when dealing with such a critical and complicated issue. It is easy to point fingers and suggest that eliminating some uses in animals would reduce antibiotic resistance in humans. But it is important to act on specific, data-driven evidence. Simple widespread bans on certain uses — including those in animals — would be detrimental to animal health and, more importantly, human health.

If we are to contain the spread of antibiotic resistance, we need careful, data-driven understanding of the sources and causes of that spread. Antibiotic resistance is a collection of specific problems, or specific pathogens resistant to particular drugs. Specific bacterial/drug combinations, or “bug-drug combos,” must be considered separately from other combinations.

Scientific risk assessments conducted by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration or by private researchers demonstrate that none of these three bacterial/drug combinations are related to the use of antibiotics in animals. Read More


Healthy livestock are essential for safe and healthy food. But as usual, the anti-animal agriculture groups are using this debate to further their agenda. It’s clear that in order to make any meaningful reform of antibiotic use, the human side must be addressed first. A perfect example would be how antibiotics are distributed in other parts of the world. In some countries you can buy them right over the counter without a doctor’s prescription. They are greatly misused in the US as well by the over-prescribing doctors and the careless patients who fail to follow directions. In the livestock industry you will never see them being used incorrectly. It costs too much money and is too important to the health of the livestock for that to happen. No one who is advocating for antibiotic use changes in livestock only can be taken seriously. ~Troy

FDA Wants Antibiotic Use in Livestock Limited

FDA seeks less use of antibiotics in animals to keep them effective for humans
By Lyndsey Layton
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, June 29, 2010; A04

The Food and Drug Administration urged farmers on Monday to stop giving antibiotics to cattle, poultry, hogs and other animals to spur their growth, citing concern that drug overuse is helping to create dangerous bacteria that do not respond to medical treatment and endanger human lives.

Joshua M. Sharfstein, the FDA's principal deputy commissioner, said antibiotics should be used only to protect the health of an animal and not to help it grow or improve the way it digests its feed.

"This is an urgent public health issue," Sharfstein said during a conference call with reporters. "To preserve the effectiveness [of antibiotics], we simply must use them as judiciously as possible."

The FDA issued a draft of its guidance, and the public has 60 days to comment on the draft.

Sharfstein said that the guidance was a first step, and the agency would issue new regulations if the industry does not comply voluntarily.

"We have the regulatory mechanisms, and industry knows that," he said. "We also think things can be done voluntarily. We're not handcuffed to the steering wheel of a particular strategy, but I'm not ruling out anything that we can do to establish these important public-health goals."

Read More


Human health is certainly a top priority but one of the things that has helped us avoid any large health disasters is the fact that we have kept our livestock very healthy as well. Along with that, there isn’t any good scientific data to suggest that this will make a difference. After all, livestock producers would have to treat disease after the fact rather than prevent it. The last thing to consider is the fact that until human usage is of antibiotics is better controlled any changes to livestock use would be pointless. The very same drugs that require a prescription here can be bought over the counter in other countries. We definitely need to protect the efficacy of antibiotics but only focusing on livestock use is a lazy solution to a difficult problem.

Katie Couric's Report on Antibiotic Use in Livestock

Watch CBS News Videos Online

Tonight will begin the two part series on CBS News about antibiotic use in livestock. Unfortunately by the looks of the preview, Katie is going to be more interested being an activist rather than a journalist. Just count how many times she uses the undefineable term "factory farm" in this preview.

I am very concerned about "superbugs" and antibiotic resistance, just like everyone else. However, attacking one area of usage, mostly the low hanging fruit, will not help. All of us use products that are designed to kill bacteria every single day. If we want to have a serious discussion about antibiotic resistance, we are going to need to evaluate everything. I will be disappointed if Katie doesn't address that.

This should open up many opportunities for family farmers and ranchers to explain how and why they use antibiotics. Their is a big misconception that all livestock are fed antibiotics all the time. The phrase most commonly used is "they are pumped full of antibiotics". They are just too expensive to do such a thing. I don't know who she refers to everytime she talks about a factory farm, but everyone that I know who raises livestock tries to give them the very best care possible.

That's the story I am looking forward to sharing with people.