Finally! The FDA Restricts Use of Antibiotics in Livestock (update 2)

[ProSense]

Last edited Thu Jan 5, 2012, 10:15 AM - Edit history (3)

Finally! The FDA Restricts Use of Antibiotics in Livestock

New York Times

After issuing "a draft guidance" in July 2010 in hopes that the livestock industry would take voluntary action, The Obama Administration and the FDA have wised up and are now restricting the use of a critical class of antibiotics in cattle, pigs, chickens and turkeys because such practices may have contributed to the growing threat of bacterial infections in people that are resistant to treatment.

The medicines belong to a class of antibiotics known as cephalosporins and include such brands as Cefzil and Keflex. They are among the most common antibiotics prescribed to treat strep throat, bronchitis, skin infections and urinary tract infections. Surgeons also often use them before surgery to prevent bacterial infections.

The drugs’ use in agriculture has, according to many microbiologists, led to the development of bacteria that are resistant to the drugs’ effects, a development that many doctors say has endangered the lives of patients.

Antibiotics are often added to animal feed and are used routinely to encourage rapid growth of livestock, but officials at the Food and Drug Administration have been increasingly vocal in their concerns that overuse of antibiotics in agriculture is endangering human health.

In fact, 80% of all antibiotics in US are given to well animals! This is very good news today as it should require the livestock industry especially factory farms, to improve conditions for livestock on factory farms as the antibiotics have been used to prevent animals from getting sick due to extremely close confinement and poor treatment.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/01/04/1051664/-Finally

Pew Applauds FDA Measure to Preserve Effectiveness of Critical Antibiotics

January 4, 2012

WASHINGTON -- The Pew Campaign on Human Health and Industrial Farming today praised the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for limiting the use of cephalosporins in food animal production.

Cephalosporins are vital treatments for children suffering from infection; unlike other antibiotics, such as fluoroquinolones and tetracyclines, they carry no warnings or precautions for pediatric use. They also are important medicines for treating people suffering from bacterial meningitis and infections of the bone, urinary tract, and upper respiratory system, as well as those associated with cancer.

“We applaud FDA’s move,” said Laura Rogers, project director of the Pew Campaign on Human Health and Industrial Farming. “This restriction is a victory for human health, as it will help ensure we can still rely on cephalosporins to treat life-threatening infections today and in the future.”

Although FDA has approved cephalosporins to treat some infections in food animals, the drugs often are administered in ways not specifically approved by the agency. Its rule will apply to such extralabel use of cephalosporins in meat and poultry production, which multiple studies have linked to the emergence of cephalosporin-resistant bacteria that can infect people.

If cephalosporins continue to be overused on industrial farms, these drugs will lose their effectiveness. As a result, many human infections will become more difficult to treat, leading to more deaths and higher health care costs.

http://www.saveantibiotics.org/newsroom/pr_04Jan2012.html

Updated to add...

FDA Takes a Baby Step on Factory Farm Antibiotics

—By Tom Philpott

For a few months now, Obama's FDA has been showing zero appetite for standing up to the meat industry on factory-farm livestock use. In two key decisions (here and here), the agency declined to impose real restrictions on farm drug use, promoting a "voluntary" approach instead.

But today, the FDA abruptly canned the lapdog schtick and growled like a real watchdog: It banned certain uses of the cephalosporin family of antibiotics. The FDA declared in a press release:

Cephalosporins are commonly used in humans to treat pneumonia as well as to treat skin and soft tissue infections. In addition, they are used in the treatment of pelvic inflammatory disease, diabetic foot infections, and urinary tract infections. If cephalosporins are not effective in treating these diseases, doctors may have to use drugs that are not as effective or that have greater side effects.

Citing concern that routine use on factory farms will push pathogens to develop resistance to these pesticides, the FDA has banned certain uses of them. Now before I show just how limited this move is in the grand scheme, I have to stress its historical significance. For 34 years, the agency has been wringing its hands over the dangers of farm livestock abuse, all the while doing precisely nothing about it (save for appointing committees and issuing polite requests for "judicious" use). Now it's actually regulating. The Pew Campaign on Human Health and Industrial Farms, which advocates a ban on routine antibiotic use, praised the move Wednesday as an "important first step" in addressing the problem.

- more -

http://motherjones.com/tom-philpott/2012/01/fda-takes-baby-step-factory-farm-antibiotics

[slay]

2. I am recommending this

as much for the good news in the post as the fact that it's finally not a pro-Obama or anti-Greenwald propaganda thread from you.

k&r

[REP]

3. Yay!

There's a lot of reasons I avoid factory-farmed meat as much as I can, but this is a step in the right direction for the animals we eat.

I pretty much stopped eating turkey unless it came from a particular source because I was having the weirdest reactions nearly every time I ate it - it was like an allergic reaction (mouth and throat swelling plus very bad asthma), which made no sense, since I'm not allergic to any meats. I am highly allergic to cephalosporins, though. Makes me wonder.

[Trillo]

4. Curious contrast with this report

http://www.democraticunderground.com/100285096

Perhaps this is a psychological technique. Put out the opposite news item a few days prior.

[SpiralHawk]

5. That is curious

Good catch, Trillo.

[ProSense]

6. No

"Perhaps this is a psychological technique. Put out the opposite news item a few days prior. "

...that was a report by someone who interpreted a line in the registry as the FDA moving backward. It appears to me, that given the 2010 action, they were simply pulling the old proposals that were never implemented, but were preparing to move forward based on the 2010 guidance.

http://upload.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=89129

[Catherina]

7. Another huge cave. All the FDA did was restrict the use of ONE type of antibiotic (cephalosporin)

I'm sorry to burst your bubble but this is laughable. We went from a total Danish-style ban to a cute little restriction on only cephalosporin antibiotics.

FDA limits some antibiotics in livestock

By MARY CLARE JALONICK

The Food and Drug Administration has moved to limit the use of an antibiotic that is injected into livestock before slaughter, saying it could increase antibiotic resistance in humans.

...

The FDA said Wednesday it will restrict the use of cephalosporin antibiotics, which are given to some cattle, swine, chickens and turkeys before slaughter. The drugs are used to treat pneumonia, skin infections and meningitis, among other diseases, in humans.

...

The FDA order is not a total ban, and the agency would still allow some uses of the drug in agriculture. Advocates praised the move but said it didn't go far enough.

"This is a modest first step by the FDA, but we're really just looking at the tip of the iceberg." said Rep. Louise Slaughter, D-N.Y., a microbiologist who has pressured the government on the issue. "We don't have time for the FDA to ploddingly take half-measures. We are staring at a massive public health threat in the rise of antibiotic-resistant superbugs. We need to start acting with the swiftness and decisiveness this problem deserves."

...

http://www.businessweek.com/ap/financialnews/D9S2A0M81.htm


FDA Curbs One Class of Farm Drugs
By Maryn McKenna January 4, 2012


Here’s a bookend to the Food and Drug Administration’s disappointing Christmas Eve notice that it will cease trying to regulate the largest classes of growth-promoter antibiotics. Today, the agency announced that it is forbidding certain uses of a different class of drugs, cephalosporins.

...

Good: The FDA is taking regulatory action, a strong contrast to the “voluntary reform” path it declared itself in favor of last week.

Bad: The regulatory action is only partial — it covers only some “extra-label” uses of cephalosporins, though those are important — and is three years late. In 2008, the FDA promulgated and then withdrew a ban on all extra-label uses of cephalosporins; this replacement ban comes with exceptions.

Bad: Cephalosporins are one of the least-used of the agricultural antibiotics. According to the FDA’s Summary Report on Antimicrobials Sold or Distributed for Use in Food-Producing Animals, there were only 24,588 kilograms (54,207 pounds, or 27.1 tons) of cephalosporins used in food-producing animals in the US in 2010, compared to 5.6 million kilograms (12.3 million pounds, or 6,164 tons) of tetracyclines.

...
http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2012/01/fda-curbs-drugs/

These itsy, weenie, teenie steps aren't fooling anyone. The FDA recently received a big fat F for their terrible response to antibiotics in livestock from the Government Accountability Office (www.grist.org/food/2011-09-16-government-report-gives-usda-and-fda-failing-grade-on-protecting) and is being sued over their unwillingness to seriously tackle this danger to public health.

On the brighter side

On the brighter side, several organizations, including the Natural Resources Defense Council, the Center for Science in the Public Interest, and Public Citizen have actually [link:switchboard.nrdc.org/blogs/plehner/nrdc_files_lawsuit_to_preserve.html|filed a lawsuit against the FDA] demanding the agency restrict antibiotics in animals. This is promising, because courts have shown more interest in defending science than the federal agencies (see this example from last year regarding rBST/rBGH in milk: www.grist.org/article/food-2010-10-06-court-rules-on-rbgh-free-milk).

http://civileats.com/2012/01/03/fda-gives-up-on-antibiotic-restrictions-in-livestock/

To really understand what's going on here folks, follow Maryn McKenna's blog Superbug, over at Wired.com.
In "FDA Won’t Act Against Ag Antibiotic Use" (www.wired.com/wiredscience/2011/12/fda-ag-antibiotics ), which she wrote right before the FDA settled on this little token gesture, she gives a very good rundown on what's going on here.

With no notice other than a holiday-eve posting in the Federal Register, the US Food and Drug Administration has reneged on its long-stated intention to compel large-scale agriculture to curb over-use of agricultural antibiotics, which it had planned to do by reversing its approval for putting penicillin and tetracyclines in feed.

(Read the rundown)

http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2011/12/fda-ag-antibiotics/

[ProSense]

8. Let's see

"Another huge cave. All the FDA did was restrict the use of ONE type of antibiotic (cephalosporin)"

Calls for antibiotics to be restricted have been ignored since the 1970s, the Obama administration issues a guidance, which is met with guarded optimism, and now that the administration acts to restrict antibiotics that "another huge cave."

OK.

[Catherina]

9. Issued a guidance on a small subset but have it your way

I'm glad you find the cave-in so amusing.

[ProSense]

10. The

"Issued a guidance on a small subset but have it your way"

...current announcement isn't a "guidance," which refers to the 2010 release.


"I'm glad you find the cave-in so amusing. "

I find desperate spin amusing.