Center for Food Safety is calling on the FDA to protect public health, not factory farms. The overuse of antibiotics on these farms is compromising public health, since 70 to 80% of antibiotics used in this country are given in sub therapeutic levels to farm animals. The drugs are used as growth promoters and to prevent illness in unsanitary and overcrowded conditions, two conditions that promote the growth of antibiotic-resistant bacteria.
They have put together a petition you can sign to ask the FDA to make the proposed Veterinary Feed Directive a law, not a guideline. Since it is only a guideline, no factory farm in the nation has to comply with it.
The National Academy of Sciences has said that “a decrease in antimicrobial use in human medicine alone will have little effect on the current situation [of antibiotic resistant bacteria]. Substantial efforts must be made to decrease inappropriate overuse in animals and agriculture as well.”
The FDA has allowed this practice to continue in spite of court rulings against their use. Two years ago, a federal judge ordered the FDA to continue the process of removing antibiotics from animal feed. The only thing the FDA has done in response to that ruling is to issue the voluntary guidance that has been criticized by many food safety and consumer advocate groups.
