Making Sure Our Antibiotics Work

As a Microbiologist and a Member of Congress, I have been increasingly concerned with the recent rise of antibiotic resistant bacteria, or "superbugs." Quite simply, we are losing the ability to treat human infections and diseases because we have misused one of the greatest scientific products ever created.

Last March, I introduced the Preservation of Antibiotics for Medical Treatment Act (PAMTA) to address this critical problem and next week I am very excited to say that the Committee on Rules will be holding its first ever hearing on this critical topic. I encourage you to attend my hearing and let others know about the work we are doing on this issue -- there are many people out there that will resist our efforts and I will need your help.

Right now there are seven classes of antibiotics certified by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) as "highly" or "critically" important in human medicine that are used as animal feed additives by many in the agriculture industry, including penicillin and tetracycline.

PAMTA will require the FDA to review the safety of using these medically significant antibiotics in animal agriculture, and phase out their use unless manufacturers can prove that there is no danger to public health from increasing bacterial resistance to these drugs.

According to the Union of Concerned Scientists:

"70 percent of antibiotics produced in this country -- nearly 13 million pounds per year -- are used in animal agriculture for these nontherapeutic purposes. This amount is estimated to be more than four times the amount of drugs used to treat human illness."

This overuse of medicine is creating "superbugs" that are now resistant to the antibiotics doctors prescribe us, and even now we're starting to see this bacteria in our food.

PAMTA will critically shift the burden of proof to the drug manufacturers to make sure antibiotics used in farm animal production have no human health impacts. It would also drastically improve our knowledge of antibiotic use in industrial farming, equipping us to make better decisions and more effectively combat the growing problem of antibiotic-resistant bacteria.

I am taking action in Washington this week to raise awareness of this issue and its impact on food policy. I am sponsoring the special screening of the film Food, Inc. at the Capitol Visitor Center on Thursday night in addition to the Rules Committee hearing that I am chairing on PAMTA next Monday, July 13th.

There is little doubt that antibiotic resistant diseases are a growing public health menace, demanding a high priority response.

Comments

[NickHP]

Congratulations on good sense, Congresswoman Slaughter.

[quidam56]

As a former health care giver, I am shocked to see what is called quality health care now in Tennessee and Virginia. http://www.wisecountyissues.com/?p=62 Clearly profit care is more important than patient care. Filty hospitals and emergency rooms are breeding MRSA and spreading it all over our communities. I have been to everyone from town hall to the court house to the white house and all I get is either an excuse, passed on to someone else or nothing at all. How many more innocent people have to die for a health care lie ???

[itmaybetoolate]

In related news, WHO is reporting cases of the new H1N1 virus that do not respond to treatment with Tamiflu. These organisms evolve, and they evolve quickly.

[classicalgeek]

Brava! I hope that next you'll consider introducing legislation to protect us from known endocrine disruptors, which among other things, contribute to infertility, low intelligence, developmental disorders, diabetes, breast and prostate cancer, early puberty, and obesity.

[vippy]

Well, we need not stop there. Let us address the hormones injected into meat, fruit to last many weeks so it does not even taste like fruit anymore, etc. etc. I am glad Europe is not taking our meat
and Japan neither. Look how obese our population gets with those hormones and then blame and
tax the individual. Ridiculous!

[themainpoint]

Good idea Congresswoman. As for alternatives to antibiotics for antibiotic resistant diseases, there is conclusive evidence that Manuka honey kills staff infection.

And ever since I began taking standardized echinacea tincture and drinking loads of water any time I'm around someone else who is sick, or anytime I feel worn out, In the 15 years since I have been doing this, I have been sick only 3 times.

In the meantime, perhaps more doctors should teach prevention, good nutrition and use alternatives when antibiotics fail to work.

[vippy]

I stick with good nutrition and I take my vitamins to make up for the lack in the food we are being
offered. I wish the government would not inject hormones into meat (for greedy purposes obviously), and sell fresh fruit as it shoud be. I am 65 years old and never was sick, always among people who are sick and it does not rub off.

[Anandas]

The biggest threat to human health is the brainwashing and mass media blasts
to the general public that they "need" drugs to have health to begin with. We have
a fear mongering disease "care" system, not a health care system. No mention
here of our OWN IMMUNE SYSTEMS, which have since the dawn of time protected
us from disease. We can support and nourish this system through alternative
and preventative health care, not through the pushing of more and more and more
drugs and antibiotics which imbalance our own systems.

Our HEALTHY inner ecology is naturally made to live in symbiosis with a microbial
community. They are supposed to be there, not killed off by massive use of drugs.
The healthy people I know- those who WORK on their health, have no concerns whatsoever
about infections. Infections prey upon weak and sick people, not "people without drugs".

Let us use our considerable intelligence to set aside greed and special interests
to support and endow society to engage in health building through supportive practices-
I know this will take profits away from Big Pharma , hospitals, and other agencies
who make millions off of our ignorance and sickness, but the plain truth is we just
do not have to be that sick, and reliance on drugs makes us much sicker.

[sixyfivepercentwater]

Regulation of antibiotic use in food animals is a step in the right direction, but we need to look at why antibiotics are being given to these animals in the first place. They are kept in inhumane conditions where infection is rife. If we could move to a more human model for livestock production, we'd be doing so much more than just passing another law which might or might not be enforced. If animals were raised as they used to be for generations, out in the open with the right food and adequate space around them (as they are in Europe to this day) there would be no need to give them antibiotics.

Another factor in the development of antibiotic­-resistant strains of bacteria is the fact that most patients do not take the full course of any antibiotic that is prescribed to them. This known behavior has two knock-on effects: the bacteria which are still in the patient's system (although the patient feels better) "learn" to thrive despite antibiotics, and the excess medication is disposed of into landfills or - worse - dumped into a toilet somewhere, where it is not filtered out by the public water system.

[thenorthshore]

waaaaaa

can't the government DO something about that __________(fill in blank)

we can send a man to the moon but we cant put aluminum foil in the microwave.

can't the government DO something about that

[NickHP]

Hey uneducated thenorthshore. Read "Guns Germs Steel" where the author discusses wiping out of many ethnic groups (Africans, and North American and South American natives), because they were exposed to novel infectious agents they had never experienced. Agents evolved in animal husbandry, and adapted to humans due to the proximity of the handlers. Today I give you MRSA, and bird and swine flu (we may loose a million people this year due to this last one) as examples. And maybe pick up a little biology to understand the development of bacterial resistance as a result of exposure to chemicals and evolution.

[keithdengenis]

"But, they make me feeeel better. I can't afford to be sick...".

It aint just cows that get them over prescribed.

[roseau]

Thank you! Last year a doctor told me about this situation, where antibiotic use in agribusiness was destroying it's efficacy as a toll in human medical treatment.

I'll support this bill. I also encourage people to purchase antibiotic free meat, and to eat less meat. the only thing that will change agri-business if this bill fails (or is watered down) will be market pressure.

[midwestdoc]

Bravo Rep. Slaughter. I wish half the Congress had half your brains.

[BldHrtLibDem]

Yes Yes Yes! Remember the anthrax scare when they wanted to put EVERYONE on Cipro 'just in case'?
Cipro is one of those truly miraculous antibiotics that would have been neutered by widespread use.
She is SO right.

[socalsue]

I agree with the Congresswoman. I'll be supporting this bill.

[pinellas]

Good news, this - thanks!
The details of current ag. practices are horrifying....