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2nd Worst City in CA8938 Posts
An issue that has slowly been gaining more attention here in America and throughout the world has been the sharp increase of antibiotic/antimicrobial-resistant diseases. A few days ago, the Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Tom Frieden, stated in USA Today that this trend, if it persists, may very well lead to the "next pandemic." Decades of progress in the medical field are at the brink of becoming obsolete. However, Frieden did not make any mention of what may very well be the main cause of the more recent surge in antimicrobial-resistant bacteria: antibiotics used on food-producing animals for the purposes of growth promotion and disease prevention.
In 1977, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) discovered that feeding livestock low doses of antibiotics from antibiotic classes that are used in human disease treatment could promote the development of antibiotic-resistant bacteria and pose a risk to human health. In 2010, the scientific peer-reviewed journal, Molecular Cell, published a study demonstrating that low-dosages of antibiotics can cause a dramatic increase in genetic mutation, and in 2011, the FDA discovered that 80 percent of all antibiotics in America were used on food-producing animals, rather than being used for human health. Also in 2011, a review of all scientific studies on antimicrobial use in farm animals found that antibiotics in food-producing animals leads to the development of reservoirs of antibiotic resistance, that antibiotic-resistant bacteria can spread through food, water, air, soil, and meat-industry workers, and that bacteria can share resistance genes with each other.
Even with these findings, however, the FDA has failed to regulate the use of antibiotics on factory farms, and instead set up voluntary guidelines with one huge, gaping loophole: that factory farms can use antibiotics under the pretext of disease prevention. Not only does this not solve the problem, but it even allows factory farms to state that they are indeed following FDA guidelines.
This year, Assembly Bill 1437 was introduced to the California state legislature, only to never even make it out of committee. The bill would have prohibited any meat from being sold in California if the livestock or poultry was administered a medically important antimicrobial for nontherapeutic use, such as growth promotion, feed efficiency, or disease prevention. Unfortunately, special interests, mainly Big Agriculture, have a vested interest to keep things as they are, so as we have experienced with the FDA, our legislators also have their hands tied due to the lobbying from deep-pocketed sources.
This is a huge and urgent public health issue that the FDA, the CDC, the World Health Organization (WHO), medical professionals and world leaders have been warning about. The WHO has stated that "a post-antibiotic era in which common infections and minor injuries can kill -- far from being an apocalyptic fantasy -- is instead a very real possibility for the 21st century." In America alone, 2 million people got antibiotic-resistant infections last year, and 23,000 died. These numbers will only rise if nothing is done to curb the overuse of antibiotics.
Meningitis and bacterial pneumonia may once again become untreatable, as well as some STIs. Infections from cuts and scrapes may lead to amputations or death. The risks from chemotherapy and radiation therapy to fight cancer may become too great because both weaken the immune system and make patients susceptible to infections.
So what should we do? As stated in the aforementioned Assembly Bill 1437, we should ban the sale of any livestock or poultry that was administered medically important antimicrobial for nontherapeutic uses. In 2010, the Danish Veterinary and Food Administration testified that the Danish ban of the nontherapeutic use of antibiotics in food animal production resulted in a marked reduction in antimicrobial resistance in multiple bacterial species. Of course, it is also important that those in the medical field/healthcare industry do not overuse or misuse antibiotics as well, but once again, the bigger issue is that 80 percent of all antibiotics in America are being used on livestock and poultry.
But won't banning the use of antibiotics on factory farms for anything other than therapeutic uses lead to an increase in dead livestock and also meat prices?
The Danish ban on nontherapeutic antibiotics in food-producing animals resulted in little change in animal morbidity and mortality, and only a modest increase in production cost. Additionally, according to the CDC, antimicrobial-resistant diseases are actually costing Americans up to $60 billion a year (up to $26 billion due to healthcare costs, and $35 billion in lost productivity), not to mention many lives.
I am vegetarian/vegan/only eat organic/etc. This doesn't concern me.
Wrong. These antimicrobial-resistant bacteria do not just travel through food, but as mentioned above, they can travel through water, air, soil, from human-to-human or other-species-to-human as well. Everyone is potentially at risk.
Why don't we just create new classes of antibiotics?
Unfortunately, we lack the funding for it, but even if we could, the overuse of antibiotics would just render them useless quickly. It is much more efficient to just not overuse antibiotics. We will still need to eventually develop new classes of antibiotics, however.
Well, if our legislators aren't doing anything, and the FDA won't do anything, what can we possibly do?
Just being aware and spreading such awareness can go a long way. There is also a grassroots effort lead by the non-profit USPIRG to stop the overuse of antibiotics on factory farms. Contacting your local representatives may also produce a small ripple, but once again, the fight is against big special interests. Unfortunately, money generally speaks louder than words here in America.
Once again, this is a public health issue that should not be taken lightly.
Sources: + Show Spoiler +
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First of all, the anti-biotics that were banned in Denmark were banned primarily because they were used as an antibiotic growth enhancer. Second of all, the veterinarian ordinated anti-biotics has increased so much that it covers the growth enhancer use and anti-biotics in 1990, before the ban (even though the mid-90 numbers before the ban were significantly higher) (1). There has been several programs about how veterinarians have been accomplices in writing out far too large amounts of anti-biotics for the ailments and particularly a teenage period for the pigs where they can get some diarrhea is treated by mass preventive use of anti-biotics in many factory farms. Newest numbers show that Netherlands has far surpassed Denmark in the fight against use of anti-biotics (they use 20% less antibiotics per kg) (2). Both contries are having problems with MRSA and other multi-resistant bacteria-strains hitting people working in farms. Denmarks ban is not really working as well as it should. If anything you should look to Netherlands for inspiration.
The solution to reducing anti-biotics in several cases are pro-biotics (3). By using an advantageous bacteria to outcompete the less desirable bacteria, the occurance of ailments can be reduced significantly. The problem is the economy. Anti-biotics are dirt-cheap, so why should you burn money on pro-biotics without knowing if it will be economically sustainable?
(1)google-translated Videnskab.dk (2)Google translated DR (3)Google translated trouw.nl
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Also remember to always eat your anti biotics for the full duration in order to reduce resistance
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On July 28 2014 21:53 Travin wrote:Also remember to always eat your anti biotics for the full duration in order to reduce resistance "But I don't feel sick anymore, why should I take more medicine?!" =/
The amount of stuff that gets shoved into animals that later gets consumed by people is pretty damn disgusting. Sadly it's just icing on the cake when it comes to how humanity treats animals in general, welp.
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2nd Worst City in CA8938 Posts
On July 28 2014 21:38 radiatoren wrote:First of all, the anti-biotics that were banned in Denmark were banned primarily because they were used as an antibiotic growth enhancer. Second of all, the veterinarian ordinated anti-biotics has increased so much that it covers the growth enhancer use and anti-biotics in 1990, before the ban (even though the mid-90 numbers before the ban were significantly higher) (1). There has been several programs about how veterinarians have been accomplices in writing out far too large amounts of anti-biotics for the ailments and particularly a teenage period for the pigs where they can get some diarrhea is treated by mass preventive use of anti-biotics in many factory farms. Newest numbers show that Netherlands has far surpassed Denmark in the fight against use of anti-biotics (they use 20% less antibiotics per kg) (2). Both contries are having problems with MRSA and other multi-resistant bacteria-strains hitting people working in farms. Denmarks ban is not really working as well as it should. If anything you should look to Netherlands for inspiration. The solution to reducing anti-biotics in several cases are pro-biotics (3). By using an advantageous bacteria to outcompete the less desirable bacteria, the occurance of ailments can be reduced significantly. The problem is the economy. Anti-biotics are dirt-cheap, so why should you burn money on pro-biotics without knowing if it will be economically sustainable? (1) google-translated Videnskab.dk(2) Google translated DR(3) Google translated trouw.nl
Thanks, I'll definitely look into what the Netherlands have done.
I don't think we can use probiotics at the moment, as we still have yet to fully explore it. Really, just gotta keep antibiotic usage at a sustainable level while we create new classes of antibiotics to replace the old ones. It's a multi-step process but it needs to be done going forward. I'm sure the economy would be worse off if there ever came a time where antibiotics were really obsolete. Probiotics may be a thing of the future though.
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I don't know this subject well enough, so a question.
If we have say 100 strains of anti biotics, how could a bacteria be immune to all of them? Wouldn't the constant mutations make the bacteria lose immunity to older strains over time? So shouldn't we hit a spot where we have "enough" variants that immunities isn't a major issue?
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I took a class in Philosophy of Medicine and this was one of the hot topics. It is surely a problem:
-Hospitals are so clean and sterilized that only the strongest bacteria resist -We can develop even stronger antibiotics (difficult and expensive) -We can mix antibiotics in some sort of cocktail (It's a nice solution but you have to continously mix and check for problems in patients)
If you are interested in some literature about this topic, check authors like Schaffner, Nordenfelt, Boorse, Wakefield (all authors from US and Canada, if I recall correctly)
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On July 29 2014 17:28 Yurie wrote: I don't know this subject well enough, so a question.
If we have say 100 strains of anti biotics, how could a bacteria be immune to all of them? Wouldn't the constant mutations make the bacteria lose immunity to older strains over time? So shouldn't we hit a spot where we have "enough" variants that immunities isn't a major issue? Over time some of the bacteria will lose the resistance (immunity is a very rare occurance in bacteria where a lot rides on statistics because it involves specific circumstances at least to current knowledge) but since the mutations are slow and the amount of bacteria are so incredibly large (1 ccm can hold 10^6 bacteria, meaning 1 liter of medium can hold about 10^9 bacteria), it will take a very, very long time. Usually anti biotics have specific targets. Most of them target a specific organel, enzyme or chain of receptors in or around the bacteria. To avoid it killing human cells too and therefore the host, the anti biotics are limited in where they target, most of the differences rely on their effectiveness in disruption the specific bacteria and not having too many collateral effects. If a bacteria becomes resistant to one type of anti biotics it has likely become resistant to several types of anti biotics at the same time depending on the specific coping mechanism it has evolved. Therefore the 100 strains of anti biotics can be dealt with due to a lot fewer changes. And few changes that cover large parts of the spread is exactly what is happening, making it far less likely for the bacteria to lose the resistance than if it had to gain 100 new traits.
Cocktails are a good solution, but the adverse effects may stack up if you go too high dose, while subclinical levels risk increasing the resistance. It is a thin edge to balance, when several drugs are used and may interact.
Regarding probiotics. The piglet diarrhea problem can be mostly solved by certain easily obtainable probiotics today and it has been used for decades by some farmers. The spraying is experimental, though, but as long as you know the pro biotics are harmless, you can concentrate on looking at occurance of ailments if you want certainty or you can make the investments to get the advantages and disadvantages of a first mover. Some already use it for non-experimental use, despite its effects still being relatively uncertain.
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On July 29 2014 19:39 radiatoren wrote:Show nested quote +On July 29 2014 17:28 Yurie wrote: I don't know this subject well enough, so a question.
If we have say 100 strains of anti biotics, how could a bacteria be immune to all of them? Wouldn't the constant mutations make the bacteria lose immunity to older strains over time? So shouldn't we hit a spot where we have "enough" variants that immunities isn't a major issue? Over time some of the bacteria will lose the resistance (immunity is a very rare occurance in bacteria where a lot rides on statistics because it involves specific circumstances at least to current knowledge) but since the mutations are slow and the amount of bacteria are so incredibly large (1 ccm can hold 10^6 bacteria, meaning 1 liter of medium can hold about 10^9 bacteria), it will take a very, very long time. Usually anti biotics have specific targets. Most of them target a specific organel, enzyme or chain of receptors in or around the bacteria. To avoid it killing human cells too and therefore the host, the anti biotics are limited in where they target, most of the differences rely on their effectiveness in disruption the specific bacteria and not having too many collateral effects. If a bacteria becomes resistant to one type of anti biotics it has likely become resistant to several types of anti biotics at the same time depending on the specific coping mechanism it has evolved. Therefore the 100 strains of anti biotics can be dealt with due to a lot fewer changes. And few changes that cover large parts of the spread is exactly what is happening, making it far less likely for the bacteria to lose the resistance than if it had to gain 100 new traits. + Show Spoiler +
Cocktails are a good solution, but the adverse effects may stack up if you go too high dose, while subclinical levels risk increasing the resistance. It is a thin edge to balance, when several drugs are used and may interact.
Regarding probiotics. The piglet diarrhea problem can be mostly solved by certain easily obtainable probiotics today and it has been used for decades by some farmers. The spraying is experimental, though, but as long as you know the pro biotics are harmless, you can concentrate on looking at occurance of ailments if you want certainty or you can make the investments to get the advantages and disadvantages of a first mover. Some already use it for non-experimental use, despite its effects still being relatively uncertain.
Also, some bacteria can do same-generation DNA communications, so even if half of the bacteria pop suddenly lost resistance, they might regain it from the other half that retained the resistance.
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factory farming is a fucking disgrace and the usage of antibiotics are only the tip on the iceberg of awfulness
good OP
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Isn't there any other approaches to the issue, besides antibiotics & probiotics ? "SoSexy" mentioned sterile and clinically clean environments ? I'm definitely no expert on this, just curious - but doesn't antibiotics in large amounts effect the natural immune system in the long term creating the need for more and more expensive antibiotics ? Another downhill spiral in drugged genetic strains.
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On July 29 2014 20:36 appletree wrote: Isn't there any other approaches to the issue, besides antibiotics & probiotics ? "SoSexy" mentioned sterile and clinically clean environments ? I'm definitely no expert on this, just curious - but doesn't antibiotics in large amounts effect the natural immune system in the long term creating the need for more and more expensive antibiotics ? Another downhill spiral in drugged genetic strains. Yes, this is indeed the problem. And bacteria are everywhere. Maintaining a clinically clean environment is not economically viable in a place where animals (or humans) live, and is indeed bad for the immune system. You can avoid the issue by having smaller scale farms and letting the pigs walk free on a larger area, but that also affects profit.
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Yeah, I thought as much - not being an option creating a clean environment, but then when does the profit of letting the pigs walk freely around exceeds the cost of having a higher percentage of disease infected animals and the cost of feeding antibiotics.. Again that spiral.
Good topic indeed !
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On July 29 2014 20:42 Duvon wrote:Show nested quote +On July 29 2014 20:36 appletree wrote: Isn't there any other approaches to the issue, besides antibiotics & probiotics ? "SoSexy" mentioned sterile and clinically clean environments ? I'm definitely no expert on this, just curious - but doesn't antibiotics in large amounts effect the natural immune system in the long term creating the need for more and more expensive antibiotics ? Another downhill spiral in drugged genetic strains. Yes, this is indeed the problem. And bacteria are everywhere. Maintaining a clinically clean environment is not economically viable in a place where animals (or humans) live, and is indeed bad for the immune system. You can avoid the issue by having smaller scale farms and letting the pigs walk free on a larger area, but that also affects profit. In the end it always comes back down to one thing: Consumers not giving a fuck and/or not being willing enough to pay for better standards.
We already know there's a market for "naturally grown with as awesome conditions as possible"-whatever but it's incredibly small compared to the "I don't care, give cheap"-whatever market. The only way to change that is to work on a really basic level. Inform yourself and try to make sure your friends and family become more informed. Buying anything while giving zero fucks about what is involved shouldn't fly anywhere in the western world.
It's your money that encourages or discourages what companies do. Use it wisely.
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On July 29 2014 21:07 r.Evo wrote:Show nested quote +On July 29 2014 20:42 Duvon wrote:On July 29 2014 20:36 appletree wrote: Isn't there any other approaches to the issue, besides antibiotics & probiotics ? "SoSexy" mentioned sterile and clinically clean environments ? I'm definitely no expert on this, just curious - but doesn't antibiotics in large amounts effect the natural immune system in the long term creating the need for more and more expensive antibiotics ? Another downhill spiral in drugged genetic strains. Yes, this is indeed the problem. And bacteria are everywhere. Maintaining a clinically clean environment is not economically viable in a place where animals (or humans) live, and is indeed bad for the immune system. You can avoid the issue by having smaller scale farms and letting the pigs walk free on a larger area, but that also affects profit. In the end it always comes back down to one thing: Consumers not giving a fuck and/or not being willing enough to pay for better standards. We already know there's a market for "naturally grown with as awesome conditions as possible"-whatever but it's incredibly small compared to the "I don't care, give cheap"-whatever market. The only way to change that is to work on a really basic level. Inform yourself and try to make sure your friends and family become more informed. Buying anything while giving zero fucks about what is involved shouldn't fly anywhere in the western world. It's your money that encourages or discourages what companies do. Use it wisely. There is indeed a market for ecology and you can indeed get an advantage from behavioural changes. But as soon as you get into the prepared foods it gets very complex very fast.
The other side of the coin is legislation. I know it is something most people hate with a passion today, but improved legislation about specific ingredients and processes may be needed and of course improved transparency. Also, extra taxation on certain antibiotics may not be such a bad idea to discourage the use of it as preventive care.
I just don't see people being able to make an educated weighing of pros and cons without a 100 page book of further information about each product and how it has been treated from soil to table. Btw. even ecological meat can have nitrit added. Its primary role today is food colouring, but it is also a carcinogen. Earlier it was added to avoid botulism but it is not necessary most places today as long as the meat is treated correctly. Just saying.
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On July 29 2014 20:26 Paljas wrote: factory farming is a fucking disgrace and the usage of antibiotics are only the tip on the iceberg of awfulness
good OP
Yeah, thanks OP for spreading the awareness.
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On July 29 2014 21:43 radiatoren wrote:Show nested quote +On July 29 2014 21:07 r.Evo wrote:On July 29 2014 20:42 Duvon wrote:On July 29 2014 20:36 appletree wrote: Isn't there any other approaches to the issue, besides antibiotics & probiotics ? "SoSexy" mentioned sterile and clinically clean environments ? I'm definitely no expert on this, just curious - but doesn't antibiotics in large amounts effect the natural immune system in the long term creating the need for more and more expensive antibiotics ? Another downhill spiral in drugged genetic strains. Yes, this is indeed the problem. And bacteria are everywhere. Maintaining a clinically clean environment is not economically viable in a place where animals (or humans) live, and is indeed bad for the immune system. You can avoid the issue by having smaller scale farms and letting the pigs walk free on a larger area, but that also affects profit. In the end it always comes back down to one thing: Consumers not giving a fuck and/or not being willing enough to pay for better standards. We already know there's a market for "naturally grown with as awesome conditions as possible"-whatever but it's incredibly small compared to the "I don't care, give cheap"-whatever market. The only way to change that is to work on a really basic level. Inform yourself and try to make sure your friends and family become more informed. Buying anything while giving zero fucks about what is involved shouldn't fly anywhere in the western world. It's your money that encourages or discourages what companies do. Use it wisely. There is indeed a market for ecology and you can indeed get an advantage from behavioural changes. But as soon as you get into the prepared foods it gets very complex very fast. The other side of the coin is legislation. I know it is something most people hate with a passion today, but improved legislation about specific ingredients and processes may be needed and of course improved transparency. Also, extra taxation on certain antibiotics may not be such a bad idea to discourage the use of it as preventive care. I just don't see people being able to make an educated weighing of pros and cons without a 100 page book of further information about each product and how it has been treated from soil to table. Btw. even ecological meat can have nitrit added. Its primary role today is food colouring, but it is also a carcinogen. Earlier it was added to avoid botulism but it is not necessary most places today as long as the meat is treated correctly. Just saying. The way I see it personally I firmly believe that the main job the legislator has (besides preventing obviously prohibiting actually dangerous stuff) is to ensure that consumers can make an as easy as possible informed choice. As it stands there are so many variations of "natural" or "biological" and "quality seals" that no one really knows what the hell is going on.
And I think over here our standard for what has to be declared in which form is pretty damn high compared to the rest of the world. =/
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[quoteThe way I see it personally I firmly believe that the main job the legislator has (besides preventing obviously prohibiting actually dangerous stuff) is to ensure that consumers can make an as easy as possible informed choice. As it stands there are so many variations of "natural" or "biological" and "quality seals" that no one really knows what the hell is going on.][/quote]
The confusion of these labels is a huge problem, there definitely needs to be clean up of the certification process. On the other hand. I have to wonder if the meat I'm buying with "no antibiotics used" actually means what I think it means...
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