In his Nobel Lecture, Alexander Fleming, the biologist whose discovery of penicillin has saved the lives of thousands, cautioned that “man may easily underdose himself and by exposing his microbes to nonlethal quantities of the drug make them resistant.” Today, the World Health Organization has deemed antibiotic resistance “a problem so serious that it threatens the achievements of modern medicine. A post-antibiotic era — in which common infections and minor injuries can kill — far from being an apocalyptic fantasy, is instead a very real possibility for the 21st century.” While prudent usage of antibiotics on an individual scale certainly helps, the greatest consumer of antibiotics in the United States is the agricultural industry. Preserving the effectiveness of a medicine which has saved millions of lives will therefore require a reduction or outright ban on the usage of antibiotics in agriculture.
There is a clear link between antibiotic usage in food animals and human health. A report published by the American Society for Microbiology found that “Substantial data show elevated antibiotic resistance in bacteria associated with animals fed NTAs (non-therapeutic antimicrobials) and their food products. This resistance spreads to other animals and human.” In the United States alone, roughly 14.8 million kilograms of antibiotics were domestically sold in 2013 for use in food-producing animals — of which 62 percent were deemed “medically important,” or important enough for treating human diseases.
An over-reliance on antibiotics in the agriculture industry holds grave effects for the entirety of humanity; consider, for example, colistin. Deemed “the last agent used to combat bacteria that are resistant to the strongest antibiotics,” bacteria possessing a colistin-resistant gene were first identified in late 2015 by Chinese scientists, before spreading to Europe and the United States. A report by The Lancet, a UK-based medical journal, found that “the use of colistin in animal feed has probably accelerated the dissemination of MCR-1 in animals and, subsequently, human beings. The predominance of MCR-1 on farms and in livestock, compared with in normal human flora and hospital infections, supports this.”
It may be argued that new antibiotics and medical advancements are being found and developed, thereby relegating antibiotic resistance to a minor nuisance at most. Though uplifting, such arguments fail to take other factors into account. Firstly, there is little financial benefit in researching and developing new antibiotics. Julian Davies, Professor Emeritus of the University of British Columbia, observed that “The period from 1950 to 1960 was truly the golden age of antibiotic discovery, as one-half of the drugs commonly used today were discovered in this period.” Furthermore, Davies notes, “It has proven ever more difficult to find novel, active compounds with the desired characteristics for use as antibiotics… they can more successfully achieve financial gain by producing ‘quality-of-life’ drugs.” As research and discovery of new antibiotics is more costly — in terms of time, money and manpower — than ever, it will take a multitude of methods to protect antibiotics from their demise.
Undoubtedly, restricting the use of antibiotics in the agriculture industry would have a negative financial impact. The U.S. agricultural industry, for example, was estimated to contribute $985 billion to the U.S. GDP in 2014 — or 5.7 percent. However, restrictions in the agriculture industry has already shown positive impacts with only minor negative consequences; a study conducted by the Danish Veterinary Institute found that “The bans on avoparcin and other antibiotics as growth promoters in the EU have provided scientists with a unique opportunity to investigate the effects of the withdrawal… although the levels of resistance in animals and food, and consequently in humans, has been markedly reduced after the termination of use, the effects on animal health and productivity have been very minor.”
Throughout history, antibiotics have been responsible for saving the lives of millions. If the effectiveness of antibiotics was neutered through a combination of misuse and misapplication, humanity would lose one of its most powerful tools in fighting disease. By banning or severely limiting antibiotic usage for the agricultural industry, the United States could take an important step in combating the rise of antibiotic-resistant bacteria.
William Wong is an Opinion columnist for The Cavalier Daily. He can be reached at w.wong@cavalierdaily.com.
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