The Deadly Addiction to Cheap Meat: How the overuse of antibiotics on livestock is making us sick

[marmar]

from In These Times:



The Deadly Addiction to Cheap Meat
How the overuse of antibiotics on livestock is making us sick.

BY Terry J. Allen


America's cheap meat habit is costing more than we bargained for. The factory farming of cows, pigs, poultry and fish sucks up 29 million pounds—80 percent—of antibiotics sold in the United States.

Many illness-causing bacteria are now resistant to most or all of the antibiotics that once killed them. While the overuse of antibiotics on humans has contributed to this public health crisis, the most egregious factor in creating antibiotic resistance is the routine, widespread, greed-driven dosing of livestock. About a quarter of U.S. meat and poultry samples contain antibiotic-resistant bacteria.

The FDA, after more than three decades of dithering, has finally acknowledged a “mounting public health problem of global significance.” But, when even industry acknowledges a serious problem, an April FDA report containing “non-binding recommendations” politely asks the food industry to use antibiotics “judiciously”—and gives industry three years to figure out how to circumvent the reforms.

In 1946, producers discovered that adding antibiotics to feed increased animal growth—and industry profits. This subtherapeutic dosing also allowed livestock to survive filthy, overcrowded conditions that would otherwise generate high and unprofitable rates of disease and death. ...............(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.inthesetimes.com/article/13350/the_deadly_addiction_to_cheap_meat

[drokhole]

1. Chalk another one up to the "law of 'unintended' consequences"...

...wherein, as usual, no one will be held accountable.

Meanwhile, about 70% of the corn/grain/soy produced in the US goes to feed livestock (mainly herbivores), which is the kind of food that promotes and produces the diseases that the antibiotics are then required to counter. What we should be doing is converting all that land to intensively managed pasture, since it serves the same purpose (feeding animals), and will produce healthy animals without need of antibiotics (not to mention a healthier environment).

[Gregorian]

2. Turbocharged farming.

Trying to feed more people than the planet naturally provides. In other words, overpopulation.

[Mz Pip]

7. I think so too.

7 billion people and counting. I think it would be pretty hard to feed that many people without some kind of giant food production mechanism. Feeding all the cattle just takes up space that could be used for crops for people.

[Kalidurga]

3. This isn't why I stopped eating meat...

but it is one of the many reasons I continue to not eat meat. I can't say it is easy I was a meat eater for decades and love it. But, in January my youngest informed me she was going to be a vegan and she wanted support, translated that means making vegan meals several times a week. I compromised and told her I would go vegetarian and just not put cheese in her food. Long story short, she quit after just a few weeks. I did some research in the mean time and things and phrases like Pink Slime, Meat Glue, Growth Hormones and Antibiotics popped up so I decided I would just continue to look for vegetarian options, one day I hope I will go full vegan, but I am still working on adjusting to no meat.

[RebelOne]

5. I stopped eating meat 15 years ago,

and the tainted meat was one reason along with my compassion for animals.

[xxqqqzme]

8. It is why I stopped

eating meat. I think the last hamburger I had was in '82.

When I ran for office in '10, I was at a lunch/meeting of a Senior group. They served meat loaf. Out of curiosity I broke off a small corner and put in my mouth. I removed it immediately because the overwhelming taste was medicinal. I don't know if I was over sensitive to the taste because it had been so long since eating meat. There is just no way I could eat meat again.

[freshwest]

4. Factory farming makes everthing sick, water, animals, people. Thanks for the link, it has great ..

Articles on the Left, Public Education, Green Economy and Housing.

Good stuff there.

[RadiationTherapy]

6. If we don't factory farm like this, we cannot eat as much as we want whenever we want.

While I personally am open to discussion about limiting access to food beyond financial issues (the only limiter to access in America), many people consider it a fundamental principle of living in capitalist America. The belief that one should have access to as much food as one can afford has led our prosperous country down the road of factory farming. Unless we address this ideology, my prediction is that factory farming will continue to grow and get more toxic.

[Gregorian]

9. In these numbers.

That's the part that's missing from your subject line. The elephant in the room that no one wants to see or talk about. In smaller numbers not only can we eat as much as we want whenever we want, but the food is good. Not cardboard carrots, plastic tomatoes.

I remember good food. Now you can hardly buy a lemon that isn't green. They can't even ripen fast enough for this many mouths.

Check out the Bosch-Haber cycle. It was invented during a competition in the early part of the last century to figure out a way to feed more people, because we weren't able to keep up with the number of mouths back then. And that was only a billion.