CREDO Action
Even the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) admits it: Rampant overuse of antibiotics in livestock is breeding new strains of drug-resistant bacteria, reducing the overall effectiveness of antibiotics and posing a major threat to public health.
So it was all the more disappointing when the FDA issued new rules in April that allow factory farms to continue overusing antibiotics, making compliance totally voluntary.
The FDA is accepting comments on the new rule until Thursday, July 12. We need to push for a strong, mandatory standard.
Today, 80 percent of all antibiotics are used on livestock, and this massive overprescription is breeding new strains of antibiotic-resistant bacteria—like the E. Coli strain that killed 30 people in Europe last year, and MRSA, a type of staph infection that now kills more people in the U.S. every year than AIDS.
For 35 years, Big Ag and the veterinary pharmaceutical industry have successfully fought off tough regulations, but the problem is becoming more urgent. And the FDA needs to step in.
Rather than saving them for sick animals, meat producers use antibiotics as a growth stimulant, and to compensate for extreme overcrowding and unsanitary conditions in factory farms which can lead to sick animals.
The FDA’s voluntary new rules say antibiotics shouldn’t be used as growth stimulant but allow for their continued preventative use—a loophole that allows even those voluntarily complying with the law to maintain unsanitary conditions and antibiotic overuse in the name of disease prevention.
The FDA must pass mandatory standards that preserve the effectiveness of antibiotics for all of us, and stop their use on animals except in cases of illness.
Visit EcoWatch’s FACTORY FARMING page for more related news on this topic.
Between doctors over-prescribing antibiotics and Big Ag/veterinary pharmaceutical industry’s refusal to stop injecting livestock, we are headed for serious problems. The FDA needs to enforce stricter laws immediately.
It is a disgrace what this country is doing to its population. It seems every day you wake up and there is something new that is upside down for the betterment of the AMERICAN people. If the FDA agrees with this “rampant overuse of antibiotics” then what are they waiting for…DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT BEFORE IT IS TOO LATE. Will it be “big business” and “money talking people” that will be the downfall of this once great nation. Shame on the powers that be FOR NOT DOING THEIR JOB. Letting this invader from within sicken our society with the food we eat is barbaric.
FDA – KEEP ANTIBIOTICS OUT OF OUR FOOD – THAT IS WHY WE HAVE A FAT POPULATION – YOU ARE KILLING US
Please, do the right thing for all citizens. Forcing us to consume antibiotics in our foods make us susceptible to antibiotic resistant diseases.
People have the right to clean, healthy unadulterated food. Antibiotics saved many lives when first developed – but now are decreasing in efficacy because of extreme overuse and misuse. Corporate America does not have the right to harm animals (unclean growing conditions that necessitate misuse of antibiotics) or the American food supply. Now we know. So now it has to stop. Thank you.