Antibiotic Resistance : The Setting

Presently, speculations have risen about the amount of antibiotics used in the livestock industry and the desire to consume antibiotic-free meats. What is not understood, however, is the USDA has been monitoring the amount of antimicrobial residue in meats for several years. If unsafe levels are detected the meat is not allowed to be sold for human consumption. Yet, fast food chains such as Subway and Chipotle are claiming to go completely antibiotic free within the next decade. The practicality of this becoming a reality is slim due to the need to control, treat, and prevent diseases. To truly understand the importance of the antibiotic usage in cattle it must first be understood what antibiotics are and the reasons they are used. Additionally, the use of vaccinations should be taken into account for the

Antibiotic use in animals has recently captured the attention of various professionals as the blatant, adverse effects have become increasingly prevalent. Agricultural manufacturers carelessly inject livestock with antibiotics in order to maximize their weight gain by minimizing the amount of energy consumed in fighting illnesses. This broad use of antibiotics in food-producing animals has contributed to the emergence and distribution of antibiotic-resistant bacteria, resulting in either mild or fatal illnesses. To put the severity of this issue in perspective, legislators must realize that 1 in 5 antibiotic-resistant infections are caused by bacteria from food and animals. Although antibiotic use in animals is not the sole culprit of the

One environment where bacteria are regularly exposed to antibiotics is in large livestock operations, where producers very often treat their cows and other animals with drugs to prevent epidemics in the unsanitary and overcrowded conditions, which are common in the livestock industry. The simple reason for this is that in the short term it is cheaper to drug up the animals with antibiotics than to keep a clean living environment for them. Another big reason for these producers to drug up the animals is the fact that feeding antibiotics to the livestock makes for larger animals. The problem occurs when bacteria in these animals survive the bombardment of antibiotics, and some always do, the

Farm animals receive 30 times more antibiotics (mostly penicillins and tetracyclines) than people do. The drugs treat and prevent infections. But the main reason farmers like them is that they also make cows, hogs and chickens grow faster from each pound of feed. Resistant strains emerge just as they do in humans taking antibiotics--and remain in the animal's flesh even after it winds up in the meat case. (par. 8)

When walking down the grocery store aisles, most shoppers do not pause to think about the issues that may arise from the antibiotics used in animals (the meat they will buy and consume). Antibiotics have been used in farm animals for decades, but now there has arisen a controversy regarding how these antibiotics effect people (consuming the livestock that has been treated with antibiotics) and the animals (that have been treated) themselves. Many researchers believe that the use of antibiotics on animals is causing antibiotics resistance in both the animals that are being treated, and the humans who eventually eat the meat produced. But the use of antibiotics has come a long way since it was first discovered. Progress is important but safety is a priority in food production.

Also known as superbugs, these bugs are resistant to our modern day antibiotics. People around the world are trying to figure out alternatives to this plague. These bugs have evolved over years and years becoming stronger and passing down genes from generation to generation, To slowly become the super bugs that they are known as today. Often these resistant genes are caused by overuse of antibiotics by humans and farm animals, but this is not always true. Recently the ARS (the American Recorder Society) found antibiotic resistance in prairie soils that had no human contact. Antibiotic resistance is commonly viewed as a result of antibiotic overuse in humans and animals, Recently found antibiotic-resistant

Since the discovery of antibiotics in the 20th century its use has widely prevailed. While its introduction to the medicine industry has brought many benefits like almost eradicating some diseases, its use is now bringing concern to public health. Antibiotics are excessively being used that the possibility of antibiotic resistant bacteria is a major risk. One huge source of antibiotic consumption comes from the agricultural business. Livestock like swine and poultry are fed subtherapeutic antibiotics as

Flues, colds, and diseases flow in and out through all seasons of the year. The illnesses caused many patients to go to the doctors and to get help. In return, the patients will likely get antibiotics prescribed by the doctors. Antibiotics are drugs or a type of medicine that will prevent or inhibit bacteria which is causing the infection. Many people think that antibiotics can completely cure their infection by taking them, but many people do not realize the importance of antibiotic resistance and the evolution of bacteria.

A drug-resistant organism may be introduced into a health care facility with the admission of a patient who is infected with or who has been colonized by such a strain. Alternatively, antimicrobial resistance may emerge in bacteria as a response to selective antibiotic pressure, or a resistant organism may spread from person to person. Often, a combination of these factors may be involved in the emergence and transmission of antimicrobial resistance within a health care facility (Mulvey M. and Simor A., 2009).while according to Toltzis P., (2003) stated that, the role of antibiotic exposure on the acquisition of antibiotic resistant bacteria in the intensive care nursery is difficult to calculate given the covariance of such exposure to other

With all this mass production of meat and eggs and dairy, it is no wonder our health is affected as a result of unsanitary conditions and over-drugged and over-stressed animals. The public is at risk for E. coli poisoning, salmonella poisoning, Mad Cow Disease, the swine flu, the bird flu, all which are transmittable from animal to human. Eighty percent of our nation’s antibiotics produced are distributed to farm animals, not to keep them from getting sick, but to make them grow bigger, faster and to be able to tolerate living in crowded quarters. The American Academy of Pediatrics says that this has contributed to the emergence of virulent supergerms that are resistant to antibiotics. In Sabrina Tavernise’s article, “Farm Use of Antibiotics Defies Scrutiny,” she speaks with the director of the Emerging Pathogens Institute at the University of Florida, and he states, “The single biggest problem we face in infectious disease today is the rapid growth of resistance to antibiotics. Human use contributes to that, but use in animals clearly has a part too” (Tavernise).

The substantive warrant for this argument comes from the belief that the large percentage of antibiotics given to livestock correlates to the global food demand. Supporting the agricultural contribution to bacterial resistance, Antoine Andremont points to the irony in giving animals medicine that make humans sick. He presents the factual claim that majority of poultry available in stores contains small amounts of E. coli. Furthermore, Andremont supports his claim with the comparison of animal and human intestines. He addresses the identical resistant bacteria found in both humans and animals that cause illness. The substantive warrant for his argument stems from the belief that his comparison would be accepted. In addition, Andremont conveys the policy claim that antibiotics in animals needs to be strictly regulated to have a chance in the war against resistance. He supports this with an appeal to value as he explains the rationale for using antibiotics in animal husbandry is profit driven rather than health oriented. The motivational warrant of this argument comes from the empathy of the audience towards these animals. Ultimately, antibiotic use in agriculture provides an immediate and long term threat to human and animals.

When antibiotics were created, antibiotics were designed for the human use of eradicating disease. In recent years, farmers have been pumping their livestock full of antibiotics ever since it was discovered that certain combinations of antibiotics in healthy animals can increase their body fat percentage by 3 percent. The weight gain of 3 percent was revolutionary for farmers, since each animal is worth pennies by the pound (Meat Safe 2014). Now, the cattle and poultry industry is responsible for 80 percent of all antibiotics sold. In 2011, 80 percent equivalated to over 30 million pounds of antibiotics being pumped into the American meat supply (Kessler 2013). But why is this a concern for humans? The feeding of antibiotics to the food supply is detrimental to the effectiveness of antibiotics in humans. The overuse of antibiotics in animals is contributing to the growing problem of antibiotic resistance, which can lead to a more difficult time treating common diseases and death.

According the World Health Organization (WHO), antibiotic resistance is one of the world’s greatest health threats to date (Haddox, 2013). In the article, The Health Threat of Antibiotic Resistance, Gail Haddox (2013) discusses the danger antibiotic resistance poses in today’s society and strategies to prevent the expansion of antibiotic resistance. In Europe alone, an estimated 25,000 deaths have been attributed to multi-resistant infections (Haddox, 2013). Common infections are now harder to treat due to the increased resistance to antibiotics across the world, in fact some are becoming untreatable. Antibiotics should be treated like oil, a non-renewable resource (Haddox, 2013).

The resistance of bacteria to antibiotics is becoming a grave and global medical problem. This is because whenever antibiotics are taken the development of resistance is a given consequence; bacteria adapt to changing environmental conditions through the continuous process of evolution. The main issue with antibiotics is not whether but when antibiotic resistance will occur.

Studies in the past tried to directly tie the two phenomena together and confirmed that increased usage of antibiotics were directly correlated with increased resistance to those specific antibiotics. A finding was additionally mentioned that diversifying the antibiotics used to eliminate bacterial populations and reduction in overall use of antibiotics would minimize the levels of resistance in certain bacterial species most commonly found in hospitals [8]. Additionally, Studies found that certain bacterial species with increased exposure to antibiotics are highly prevalent in waste water of hospitals.  High levels of resistance displayed in these populations pose as a major risk to environmental health if released beyond clinical waste water systems. Untreated wastewater is therefore an immediate cause of concern [8]. Thus, with this data from past and current studies, pathogens are not in themselves rare, but virulence does vary due to increased exposure to antibiotics and gained resistance that has spread and will continue to do so unless habits are changed with a