Researcher says extensive use of antibiotics in agriculture creating public health crisis

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2013-12/uoc-rse122313.php

PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:
25-Dec-2013
Contact: Heath McCoy
hjmccoy@ucalgary.ca
403-220-5089
University of Calgary

University of Calgary's Aidan Hollis advocates user fees on non-human antibiotics use

Citing an overabundance in the use of antibiotics by the agriculture and aquaculture industries that poses a threat to public health, economics professor Aidan Hollis has proposed a solution in the form of user fees on the non-human use of antibiotics.

In a newly released paper published in the New England Journal of Medicine, Hollis and co-author Ziana Ahmed state that in the United States 80 per cent of the antibiotics in the country are consumed in agriculture and aquaculture for the purpose of increasing food production.

This flood of antibiotics released into the environment – sprayed on fruit trees and fed to the likes of livestock, poultry and salmon, among other uses – has led bacteria to evolve, Hollis writes. Mounting evidence cited in the journal shows resistant pathogens are emerging in the wake of this veritable flood of antibiotics – resulting in an increase in bacteria that is immune to available treatments.

If the problem is left unchecked, this will create a health crisis on a global scale, Hollis says.

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