Antibiotics On The Farm – Covert Operations For Unnecessary Germ Warfare
Of all the ways we’ve used antibiotics, allowing them in our food supply may well top the list as our biggest mistake in creating antibiotic resistant bacteria. Why? For one thing, this was mostly unnecessary germ warfare. We used antibiotics when they weren’t truly needed in the battle against germs. The antibiotics weren’t used in a search for better healthcare at all.
Also, many people are totally unaware they are consuming antibiotics in their food, so they can be exposed to antibiotics and not even know it. Unfortunately, it’ s quite pervasive. People have to eat, and a lot of the food they’re eating has been compromised.
Feeding Antibiotics to Healthy Animals
So how do antibiotics get in our food? For one thing, cattle and other meat-producing animals are often given low doses (sub-clinical levels) of antibiotic drugs to increase production. In this instance, antibiotics aren’t being used to fight disease, but because someone discovered the animals would grow faster if they were given low doses of antibiotics.
This is especially useful to industrial-style livestock operations. They’re putting as many animals as possible in the smallest space possible to increase the bottom line. Not only do they want the edge of increased weight gains from animals taking antibiotics, but there is greater need for antibiotics to prevent disease in the crowded conditions.
The exact figures vary widely depending on the source, but there is little doubt antibiotics are used much more for animals than people. After all, for the most part, people take antibiotics only when they’re sick. Many food animals such as cattle, pigs, and chickens, are given antibiotics on a regular basis to increase the profit margin.
Day after day we’re pouring antibiotics into animals. And then day after day, people eat animal products like meat from those animals.
Worse, these low doses of antibiotics aren’t strong enough to kill off microbes that have developed even a weak resistance, so that many more bacteria prone to resisting antibiotics are allowed to reproduce and continue to mutate and become stronger.
Growing Antibiotic Resistant Bacteria All Over The Farm
Having antibiotics in the animals is bad enough, but it doesn’t end there. The resistant bacteria from animals that have been on antibiotics get spread around on the farm.
J. Glenn Morris, Jr., of the University of Florida’s Emerging Pathogens Institute, said, “We looked at a confined animal operation that used tetracycline at sub-therapeutic levels to enhance growth.” And what did they find? After sampling the soil and water all over the farm, they discovered “the resistance genes for tetracycline had permeated the entire bacterial community. Everything was tetracycline-resistant. And the bacteria carried between four and five genes that made them resistant to tetracycline.”
Bacteria adapt. And they pass those adaptations around, so the antibiotic resistance genes are passed from one species or strain to another. Eventually, ALL the bacteria on the farm carry resistance genes.
And did you notice? The germs even went underground. So now the bacteria in the soil is antibiotic resistant. And the water has antibiotic resistant germs. So what about the plants growing in the soil? Don’t you suppose they too can pick up those pervasive antibiotic resistant bacteria?
A Double Edged Sword That’s Bad News In Health
This creates more than one problem with antibiotic resistant bacteria. First off, this widespread use of antibiotics in livestock is creating large reservoirs of resistance to antibiotics in animals. When people eat products from these animals, the resistance could be transferred.
Secondly, people can be exposed to antibiotic resistant bacteria from handling the raw meat when preparing meals. Without careful hand washing in-between handling different foods, the bacteria could be transferred to a raw food like salad for example. Then when a person eats the salad, or if they ate undercooked meat, they can become infected with a resistant Campylobacter or Salmonella.
And since they are resistant strains, antibiotics may not work.
Further, while the food may not actually have disease causing bacteria, it is still covered with Enterococci and other harmless bacteria. Although these bacteria may not produce disease, they can carry resistant genes picked up from the farm environment and in their new environment transfer the genes to other bacteria that aren’t so harmless.
It’s going to be a sad day if you have to wear sterile gloves in the kitchen to safely cook.
Rethinking The Use Of Antibiotics
No matter how you look at it, feeding antibiotics to animals on a regular basis is causing major problems. While hospital acquired infections are bad, not nearly as many people are exposed to them as those that are exposed every day to antibiotic resistant bacteria by eating foods from the farm.
We’ve got to rethink our use of antibiotics, and we’ve got to do it fast.
FDA Consumer Magazine, Sept. 1995
www.cdc.gov/drugresistance/
www.fda.gov/oc/opacom/hottopics/anti_resist.html
www3.niaid.nih.gov/topics/antimicrobialresistance/
www.sierraclub.org/factoryfarms/factsheets/antibiotics.asp
National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases in antimicrobial resistance. The Journal of Infectious Diseases DOI: 10.1086/533451
Nutrition Action Health Letter, October 2008
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