Misuse of Antibiotics on Large Factory Farms
Recent headlines over contaminated peanut butter, jalapeno peppers, pistachios and alfalfa sprouts have focused the country’s attention on the dangers of salmonella poisoning. Foodborne illness outbreaks are highlighting the urgent need to reform the country’s food safety system. Yet there is another food-related health hazard that may not be getting extensive media coverage but deserves our immediate attention as well—the misuse of antibiotics on large factory farms, which can serve as breeding grounds for infections.
Industrial farming operations in the U.S., where most of our nation’s meat is produced, routinely mix human antibiotics with livestock feed to promote faster growth and to compensate for crowded, stressful and often unsanitary conditions. In fact, the Union of Concerned Scientists estimates that up to 70 percent of all antibiotics used in this country are fed to farm animals.
The problem is that when low doses of antibiotics are given over a long period of time, the bacteria they’re meant to kill become more resistant. That’s why doctors warn patients to finish a short course of antibiotics if they have an infection, and never to take antibiotics if they’re not infected.
Yet on industrial farms, including farms here in Ohio, healthy animals receive prolonged low doses of antibiotics. As a result, new strains of antibiotic-resistant bacteria develop in the animals. These new, potentially deadly strains can then be transferred to humans, through contact with the animals, eating their meat, or drinking water contaminated by farm runoff.
Traditionally, large-scale meat producers have argued that feeding antibiotics to livestock cuts their costs, making food cheaper for consumers. But recent economic analysis of the use of antibiotics in poultry production suggests that the nontherapeutic use of antibiotics is no bargain. In fact, data show that improving the management of farm animals (e.g., cleaning facilities more thoroughly and frequently) achieves the same benefits.
What lessons can be drawn from peanut butter and salmonella that pertain to livestock and antibiotics? All of the recent issues with our food system show how quickly contamination can spread. They also revealed how much we depend on potent antibacterials.
Last summer, Congress passed and President George W. Bush signed legislation that required drug makers to report annually the amount, strength, dosage, and intended purpose of antibiotics used in food animals. That was an important first step in measuring the use of antibiotics on industrial farms. But more must be done to curb industrial farms’ nontherapeutic use of antibiotics—and to improve monitoring and response to human health threats.
In March, the Preservation of Antibiotics for Medical Treatment Act—www.opencongress.org/bill/111-h1549/text—was introduced in Congress. The bill would ban the nontherapeutic use of antibiotics in livestock, and both the pharmaceutical and meat industries are mobilizing against it. The people of Ohio, home to many of these factory farms, need to let their representatives know that they support this legislation.
Several years ago, Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, sponsored legislation that would phase out the misuse of human antibiotics in factory farms. Until such measures become law, so-called miracle drugs will increasingly lose their ability to work miracles, and we humans will increasingly be at risk.
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