Managing cattle manure can prevent antibiotic-resistant bacteria from contaminating crops, new study finds

Unmanaged cow manure can cause antibiotic-resistant bacteria
to proliferate. (Adobe Stock photo)

Manure and antibiotic management on cattle ranches can help prevent the growth of more antibiotic-resistant bacteria, a new study finds.

Researchers have uncovered substantial evidence that unmanaged livestock manure poses a global health risk by transmitting antibiotic-resistant genes (ARGs) when spread in fields or used to water crops.

When antibiotics are used to treat livestock, resistant bacteria and their resistance genes "can build up in cattle guts, which is then excreted into manure," reports Pragathi Ravi for Offrange. Antibiotic-resistant bacteria and their genes "reduce the effectiveness of critical medicines on humans." 

Giving farm animals antibiotics only when they are ill -- not as a way to promote growth -- is one way to prevent antibiotic-resistant bacteria and genes from multiplying, according to the World Health Organization. 

One problem with antibiotic-resistant bacteria or genes is that once they have sickened a human, there is no viable treatment. Ravi adds, "In 2021, a study published in The Lancet estimated that 4.71 million deaths were associated with antimicrobial resistance between 1990 and 2021."

Humans can become ill from contact with untreated manure or from ingesting food fertilized or watered with unprocessed manure that contains bacteria. Ravi explains, "Salmonella can grow inside a tomato, which means washing it externally is not going to help when the tomato is consumed raw."

Study researcher and professor Xun Qian told Ravi: "Livestock manure carries antibiotic resistance genes that can defeat every major class of antibiotics used in human medicine — including those considered ‘last resort.'" 

Implementing programs that support proper manure composting before it is applied to farmland can help prevent ARGs from spreading.

The land holds more than food; it contains medical breakthroughs and new medicines

"The soil is the great connector of our lives, the source and destination of all." --- Wendell Berry, The Unsettling of America, 1977

The Scoop chart

The land Berry is talking about does more than bind us together, it contains gifts that stretch beyond food. Seventy-five years ago, in Sanborn Field soil plot #23 in Columbia, Missouri, the soil yielded an incredible medical breakthrough, reports Tyne Morgan of The Scoop. Before this discovery, physicians used penicillin alongside other antibiotics with mixed results. In the 1940s, scientists pushed to find more effective and non-toxic microorganisms for people or animals.

Dr. Tim Reinbott, the director of Sanborn Field at the University of Missouri, told Morgan: "Seventy-five years ago, we had known about penicillin and other types of antibiotics, but they were only about 40% effective. . . . [Scientists]were looking for that golden antibiotic, that one that would really be very effective and be taken orally, not by injection. . . . Benjamin Duggar was working for Lederle Laboratories at the time, and he knew the director of Sanborn Field, who was William J. Albrecht, who was the soil microbiologist. Duggar asked him for some soil samples from Sanborn Field so that he could begin to culture for these microorganisms."

Duggar's soil samples "contained a golden mold that suppressed the growth of many microorganisms, including streptococci, a bacteria that causes various types of infections," Morgan writes. "From the sample, researchers eventually created aureomycin, which proved to be an antibiotic effective against 90% of bacteria-caused infections in humans." Bob Kremer, adjunct professor of soil microbiology at the University of Missouri, told Morgan, "One of the interesting facts that is often overlooked is that in any soil, you will find antibiotics, because it's just the nature of how these bacteria survive in nature."

The Food and Drug Administration approved aureomycin for human illness in 1948, and "Reinbott says for the first 30 to 40 years after the discovery of aureomycin, it was the go-to antibiotic for human medicine, but it also grew in popularity within animal medicine," Morgan reports. 

"To celebrate the discovery of aureomycin, a soil sample from Plot 23 was sent to the Smithsonian Institution, where it still resides today," Morgan writes. "The discovery at Sanborn Field wasn't just a breakthrough for human medical science, it was also a breakthrough for livestock. . . . aureomycin is still widely used in cattle today. Such an antibiotic discovery is estimated to cost $1.5 billion in 2023."

Standing at Sanborn Field, Reinbott told Morgan: "We've more aureomycin discoveries out here -- we've just got to look for them. It may or may not be an antibiotic, but it can be something just as groundbreaking, and that's what gets me excited."

New, lifesaving antibiotics don't make it to patients. Researchers say a different business model is needed.

Antibiotics have played a major role in helping to extend the average life expectancy across the world by fighting infectious diseases. But the companies that develop and produce antibiotics are struggling to make profits on the antibiotics they produce, causing severe problems in efforts to fight newer disease strains and keep patients alive. "The Treasure Called Antibiotics" explains the drugs' impact: "Prior to the beginning of the 20th Century, infectious diseases accounted for high morbidity and mortality worldwide. The average life expectancy at birth was 47 years. . . . The antibiotic era revolutionized the treatment of infectious diseases worldwide, although with much success in developed countries. . . . In the U.S., the average life expectancy at birth rose to 78.8 years."

Stock prices slide on new antibiotic companies.
(Graph by Josh Ulick,WSJ, from Dow Jones data)

But those once powerful drugs are no longer always effective. Antibiotic-resistant bacteria require new antibiotics; however, the companies that create new strains don't make money, reports Dominique Mosbergen of The Wall Street Journal. "The push for antibiotics to fight fast-evolving superbugs is snagging on a broken business model. Six startups have won Food and Drug Administration approval for new antibiotics since 2017. All have filed for bankruptcy, been acquired or are shutting down. About 80% of the 300 scientists who worked at the companies have abandoned antibiotic development, according to Kevin Outterson, executive director of CARB-X, a government-funded group promoting research in the field."


The crux of the problem is the current model for drug company profits, "which counts on companies selling enough of a new treatment or charging a high enough price to reward investors and make a profit — isn't working for antibiotics," Mosbergen explains. "New antibiotics are meant to be used rarely and briefly to defeat the most pernicious infections so bacteria don't develop resistance to them too quickly. Companies have priced them at 100 times as much as the generic antibiotics doctors have prescribed for decades, costing a few dollars per dose. Most have sold poorly."

Infectious disease specialist Dr. John. H. Rex told Mosbergen, "Antibiotics are like fire extinguishers. You really want these drugs available, but you mostly don't want to use them. That's the paradox." Mosbergen reports, "New antibiotics should get support similar to treatments for rare diseases, said Ryan Cirz, a co-founder of Achaogen, which filed for bankruptcy in 2019 less than a year after the FDA approved its drug Zemdri for complicated urinary tract infections. . . . The Orphan Drug Act of 1983 provides subsidies, tax breaks and additional years of market exclusivity to drugmakers that develop treatments for diseases affecting fewer than 200,000 people in the U.S."

"About 13,000 people in the U.S. each year develop a severe type of drug-resistant infection that Achaogen's drug Zemdri was developed to defeat," Mosenberg reports. "Up to half of people hospitalized with such infections die. They are among the more than 35,000 people in the U.S. who die annually from drug-resistant bacterial or fungal infections, a toll that has risen in recent years."

In 2019, the United Kingdom started a "subscription-style model to pay drugmakers for new antibiotics based on their potential public-health value," Mosbergen adds. "U.S. lawmakers have considered similar legislation. Bipartisan bills reintroduced in the House and Senate in April committed $6 billion to purchase new antibiotics to treat drug-resistant infections. They haven't received a vote." Dr. David Hyun, director of the Antibiotic Resistance Project at Pew Charitable Trusts, told Mosbergen: "It sounds like the intent is to save companies, but we're really talking about trying to fix the antibiotic pipeline itself."

Dangerous, parasitic fungus Candida auris is becoming more common in hospitals; here are details about it

Candida auris can be deadly. (Photo by Kateryna Kon,
Science Photo Library via Getty Images)

When you think of fungi, you may think of spring mushroom hunting, but there are many "funguses" among us. Many are "parasitic in humans and are known to cause diseases. . . . Parasitic fungi most commonly enter the body through a wound in the epidermis (skin). Such wounds may be insect punctures or accidentally inflicted scratches, cuts, or bruises," says the Encyclopedia Britannica.

That is precisely how a new fungus is infecting humans. "In late March 2023, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention highlighted the threat posed by a rapidly spreading fungus called Candida auris that is causing infections and deaths among hospital patients nationwide. The unexpected rise of this recently discovered pathogen is part of a larger trend of increasing fungal infections in the U.S.," reports The Conversation, a platform for journalism by academics.

Arif R. Sarwari is a physician and professor of infectious diseases at West Virginia University. Amid rising concerns among doctors and public health officials, Sarwari helped explain what Candida auris is, how it is spreading and how worried people in the U.S. should be." This information is particularly important for rural residents who tend to be older, sicker and have fewer medical resources for education and prevention. Here's the interview:

What is Candida auris? A recently identified, single-cell fungus that can infect humans and is moderately resistant to existing antifungal drugs. You might be familiar with superficial fungal infections – like athlete's foot or vaginal yeast infections – which are quite common and don't pose significant risks to most people. In contrast, Candida auris and other related fungi can cause infections within a person's body and are much more dangerous. . . . Recently, though, infections with species of candida that are much more resistant to drugs than Candida albicans – like Candida auris – have shot up, with a nearly fivefold increase since 2019."

How dangerous are candida infections? For the most part, healthy people do not have to worry about invasive candida infections. Two groups of people are most at risk for candida infections: first are patients in intensive care units who also have central intravenous catheters and receive broad-spectrum antibiotics. Patients with weak immune systems, such as cancer patients on chemotherapy, are also at high risk of candida infection. . . . The fungi can proliferate rapidly and overcome a person's immune system when a patient is sick and on antibiotics. . . . If candida cells on a person's skin contaminate an intravenous line, the fungus can get into a patient's bloodstream and cause often deadly bloodstream infections.

What treatments are available? Three classes of antifungal drugs can be used to fight invasive candida infections. Candida albicans are susceptible to all three and easier to treat than Candida auris, which is moderately resistant to all three classes of antifungals.

How common are invasive fungal infections? The CDC estimates that in the U.S., around 25,000 patients get candida bloodstream infections every year. . . . The recent emergence of drug-resistant and more transmissible Candida auris is raising alarms among health professionals. Because this species can contaminate surfaces and easily spread from patient to patient, the fungus is causing outbreaks both within and between hospitals.

Why are fungal infections increasing? The reasons for this increase are complicated, but I think there are two main drivers: more sicker patients in hospitals and a stressed health system. . . . I view the rise of drug-resistant fungi like Candida auris through the same lens as worsening antibiotic resistance. The more antibiotics people use, the greater the chances a resistant strain will become dominant.

What can the medical community do about it? There are a few options for fighting the rise of drug-resistant Candida auris. The most effective measures are good infection control practices. These protocols include practicing good hand hygiene taking measures to detect Candida auris infections early, and isolate patients to prevent the spread. Though relatively simple, these actions are key to preventing the spread of all antibiotic-resistant pathogens, not just fungi.

Livestock antibiotics will need a veterinarian's prescription

Photo by Harry Grout, Unsplash

Beginning in June, livestock farmers must change how they obtain antibiotics. "Most over-the-counter livestock antibiotic medications will no longer be available for purchase without a veterinary prescription," reports Courtney Love of Successful Farming. "Since 2017, the Food and Drug Administration has been trying to bring all approved livestock antibiotics under veterinary oversight. . . . This is the final phase of the FDA’s Guidance on livestock antibiotic labels."

It is also the end of a long battle to regulate the use of antibiotics in animals, driven by concern that overuse of the drugs encouarges the evolution of pathogens that are resistant to them.

Jennifer Roberts, a veterinarian with Boehringer Ingelheim, told Love, "The public has an interest in what farmers are doing to care for livestock, and there's an expectation that we are going to use antibiotics judiciously with livestock . . . . This regulation allows us to have a little more input on the farm and to have conversations with farmers about following medication protocol. . . . It will allow farmers to communicate directly with their veterinarian when using those products, making sure they're using the correct dose and following the appropriate withdrawal time."

Love explains, "Most over-the-counter medication for any species of livestock, including cattle, will be affected by this new rule. . . . However, there will be some exceptions for vaccines, dewormers, fly control. . . .The new regulation will also exempt over-the-counter products purchased before the June date and will be honored as an over-the-counter medication until it expires, says Hayley Springer, a veterinarian for Penn State Extension."

In response to the changes, retail farm stores may no longer carry certain medications. "Businesses that sell, dispense, or fill orders for animal prescription drugs must have a state pharmacy permit," Love writes. "Because of this, most brick-and-mortar farm stores might decide not to sell antibiotics once FDA requires a prescription, says Craig Payne, veterinarian, University of Missouri Extension."

Prior to June, farmers will want to prepare. "If a producer doesn’t have a veterinary-client-patient relationship with a local veterinarian, they need to establish one. This means farmers will have to find a veterinarian that is willing to become familiar with their farm and style of animal care by either one examination or timely visits to the farm," Love reports. "Producers should check the requirements in their state, as some areas have stricter guidelines. For example, South Carolina nullifies a farm's veterinary-client-patient relationship if a veterinarian has not seen the farm within one year, says the American Veterinary Medical Association."

"It's a change, but I think farmers will get used to it," Roberts told Love. "For those that have a relationship with a veterinarian, it's going to be an effortless change. For farmers that need to establish a relationship with a veterinarian, it's going to be a positive experience." Love adds, "However, Roberts acknowledges it's a change for most farmers that have valued the convenience of purchasing antibiotics whenever the need arises on their farms."

To thwart overuse of animal antibiotics, farmers will need prescriptions or a legal relationship with a veterinarian

Livestock producers who need to use antimicrobals, a variety of antibiotics important to their industry, will be divided into "the haves and the have nots" by a Food and Drug Administration rule that takes effect June 12, 2023, Rhonda Brooks writes for Farm Journal's AgWeb.

"If you have a valid veterinary-client-patient relationship, you will be able to get a prescription from your veterinarian to purchase antimicrobials from them or a distributor and use them," Brooks reports. "If you don’t have a relationship with a licensed veterinarian, you won’t be able to purchase such products, many of which have long been available over the counter."

The rule applies to "injectables such as penicillin, sulfa-based drugs, boluses, intramammary mastitis tubes and some topical products," Brooks reports. Many other drugs were covered by a similar rule in 2017.

The rules are aimed to prevent overuse of the drugs, which can lead to resistance to them, said Sandra Stuttgen, a veterinarian and associate extension professor at the University of Wisconsin.

“Our survival rates on cancer and (other diseases) are great until a patient gets a secondary bacterial infection and there is not a drug to treat it,” Stuttgen said. “People die or have to have extended hospital stays then, and it becomes very expensive and very emotional. It's a huge social impact.”

EPA allows massive use of antibiotics on citrus trees despite federal warnings antibiotic-resistant diseases will spread

The Asian citrus psyllid, which spreads
the disease (USDA photo)

Florida citrus production has dropped 70 percent in the past 15 years because of citrus greening, a disease spread by a tiny insect that carries a harmful bacteria. "The rapid onset of the disease has left growers with few effective management strategies. Since 2016, the Environmental Protection Agency has allowed citrus farmers to spray medically important antibiotics on their groves in hopes of reversing the devastating trajectory," H. Claire Brown reports for The Counter, formerly The New Food Economy. "But this last-ditch solution has its consequences: It’s expensive, and scientists aren’t sure it works very well, while public health advocates worry it’s hastening the spread of antibiotic resistance."

Today, about 90 percent of Florida's citrus trees are infected; the state produces more than two-thirds of the nation's citrus and more than 90% of its orange juice. By 2016, Florida citrus farmers were reporting an average loss of 40% of their crops from the disease. That year, EPA began allowing farmers to spray the streptomycin and oxytetracycline on citrus crops, as "emergency applications," Brown reports. Since both antibiotics are used to treat medical problems in humans, including urinary tract infections, syphilis, and tuberculosis, many public-health advocates were concerned.

"The agency was proposing to allow as much as 650,000 pounds of streptomycin to be sprayed on crops each year. That’s more than 10 times the amount used to treat human diseases. The concern was that the widespread use of antibiotics on crops would select for antibiotic-resistant bacteria, which would then spread throughout the ecosystem," Brown reports. "Antibiotic-resistant infections are expected to claim 10 million human lives by the year 2050, and critics worry the spread of so-called 'superbugs' will be aided by the extensive use of antibiotics in agriculture."

In late 2018 the EPA approved routine use of oxytetracycline on citrus groves, ignoring objections from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Food and Drug Administration, Brown reports. Emergency use of streptomycin has also been approved in California.

Despite the possible public health risk, it's unclear that the antibiotics are helping. Paul Meador, a fourth-generation citrus farmer, said the antibiotics make farming much more expensive. "He remembers spending $1,000 per acre on production costs less than two decades ago. Now he spends $3,000. And the rising bills have been accompanied by a slump in yield. Production on his land has diminished by half, if not more," Brown reports.

Meador said the antibiotics have substantially diminished his crop loss though, especially compared to citrus farmers who weren't using the antibiotics. A 2019 University of Florida study seemed to contradict Meador, finding that oxytetracycline didn't help much over six months, but that study didn't test streptomycin, which Meador uses. The study also found that injecting the antibiotics directly into tree trunks instead of spraying them on leaves might help fight the bacteria better, but injection isn't an EPA-approved application method.

National Rural Health Day, next Thursday, will be celebrated with a week of events starting Monday

The Federal Office of Rural Health Policy is planning a week of events to observe National Rural Health Day on Thursday, Nov. 21.

Monday, Nov. 18: From 9:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. ET, the National Institutes of Health will hold a seminar on the state of rural health in the U.S. at the main NIH campus in Bethesda, Maryland. For those who can't attend, the event will be videocast online here.

Nov. 19: From noon to 1 p.m. ET, The Health Resources and Services Administration will hold a webinar on addressing the opioid crisis in rural areas as it relates to women who are pregnant or have infants born addicted to opioids. Register here.

From 2 to 3 p.m. ET, the HRSA will host a Twitter chat on mental-health issues of agriculture workers. Find the chat using the hashtag #AgMentalHealth.

From 3:30 to 4:45 p.m. ET, the HRSA will host a webinar on suicide prevention in farm and ranch communities. Join the webinar here.

Nov. 20: From noon to 1 p.m. ET, the Rural Health Information Hub and the Norc Walsh Center for Rural Health Analysis will hold a webinar to discuss the new Rural Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease Toolkit. Register here.

From 1 to 2 p.m. ET, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the HRSA will hold a webinar aimed at rural health providers on improving antibiotic prescribing practices in critical-access hospitals. Register here.

From 2 to 3 p.m. ET, the HRSA will host a Twitter chat on rural substance-use-disorder issues. Find the chat by searching for the hashtag #RuralSUD.

From 6 to 10:15 p.m. ET, HRSA will host a virtual job fair aiming to bring more health-care providers to rural areas. Learn more here.

Nov. 21: From 9:45 a.m. to 3 p.m. ET, HRSA will celebrate National Rural Health Day in its D.C.-area office, including roundtables, lectures, and interactive sessions. The event will be livecast online.

At 1 p.m. ET, the Rural Health Information Hub will host a Twitter chat on how rural health organizations can access funding. Find the chat with the hashtags #RuralHealthChat and #PowerofRural.

From 2 to 3 p.m. ET, the National Organization of State Offices of Rural Health will air The Providers, a documentary about rural health-care providers, and lead a live discussion about it. Find out more here.

Sexually transmitted diseases are on the rise as funding to prevent and treat them falls

Health officials are worried about this strain of gonorrhea that
is resistant to antibiotics. (Centers for Disease Control photo)

"Health officials are tracking record-breaking rates of sexually transmitted disease, including a resurgence of some infections which had been considered rare, such as gonorrhea and syphilis. These STDs are on the rise amid cuts to public health budgets dedicated to testing, prevention, and public outreach," Mary Meehan reports for Ohio Valley ReSource, which covers Kentucky, Ohio and West Virginia.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported 2.4 million new cases of STDs in 2017; about 40 percent of those were among people aged 15 to 25. The number of babies born with syphilis increased from 362 in 2013 to 918 in 2017, mostly in Southern and Western states. In some Ohio Valley communities, chlamydia infections rose more than 200 percent and gonorrhea rose 1,000 percent or more between 2011 and 2017, Meehan reports.

The surge among younger people could stem from a greater likelihood to engage in risky sexual behavior. Jim Thacker, spokesperson for the Madison County Health Department in Kentucky, told Meehan that people born after the AIDS epidemic was largely contained may be less fearful about STDs. And the availability of effective, long-term birth control might make young adults and teens less prone to use condoms, he said.

Some of those affected by STDs are much younger than teens: according to a recent CDC report, more infants are dying after catching syphilis from their mothers during birth. Syphilis is easily treated with antibiotics, but an untreated pregnant woman has up to an 80 percent chance of passing it on to her baby during birth, Meehan reports.

Matt Prior, spokesperson for the nonprofit National Coalition of STD Directors, told Meehan that STDs are a public health crisis often hitting areas already hurting from the opioid epidemic, such as Appalachia.  Meehan reports, "As rates go up, Prior said, funding has gone down. So while STDs have increased by 30 percent in the last five years to reach an all-time high, the amount of federal money for prevention and education has consistently gone down since 2003. Prior says that federal funding is critical for states like Kentucky, West Virginia and Ohio."

Prior told Meehan, "The federal STD prevention line is the only line or funding streams these states have so it is really the first and last line of defense."

Two-day workshop in Washington will explore changes in use of antibiotics on food animals, and the ramifications

Antibiotic use in food-animal production and related issues will be the focus of a workshop Sept. 6 and 7 at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. The U.S. Department of Agriculture's Economic Research Service is organizing the workshop in collaboration with Farm Foundation.

"In the last two years, private companies and producers have been considering when and how antibiotics are used to satisfy consumer demand for products from food animals that have been raised with few or no antibiotics, as well as to comply with the new rules the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has implemented regarding antibiotic use in food animal production," notes a Farm Foundation press release. "This rapidly-changing landscape has also sparked discussion about how to incentive the development of new animal pharmaceutical products to which antibiotic resistance is less apt to develop. Often lacking in these discussions is information about the economic costs and benefits of such initiatives."

ERS Research Economist Stacy Sneeringer says, "In order to be able to make good policy and management decisions, public and private decision makers may benefit from information on the volume of antibiotics used, the costs of reducing antibiotic use and the demand for products produced with fewer antibiotics. But there are challenges surrounding confidentiality, costs and benefits of reducing antibiotic use, as well as in defining appropriate metrics."

The agenda is designed for academics, federal analysts, policymakers, non-profit representatives and industry stakeholders. Here is a tentative agenda. The workshop will include presentation of new research on the economic aspects of changing antibiotic use on U.S. farms, as well as information on collection of data on the sale and use of antibiotics in U.S. food animal production. Other topics to be addressed include: Changes in costs, practices and structures in the U.S. livestock sector and associated industries due to the recent FDA policy changes on antibiotic use in food animal production; consumer demand for products raised without antibiotics and the associated price premiums; challenges of supplying U.S. beef raised with fewer antibiotics; the potential applicability to animal pharma of incentive mechanisms used in human pharma; and analysis of ongoing efforts to collect data on antibiotic use in U.S. food animal production. 

The workshop is free, but registration is required by close of business on Aug. 30. For more information, call Sneeringer at 202-694-5504 or Mary Thompson at Farm Foundation, 630-601-4152.

WHO asks farmers to give animals less antibiotics; pork lobby says proposed ban would be amoral

A piglet on an Illinois farm gets a shot of antibiotics.
(Chicago Tribune photo by Stacey Wescott)

"The World Health Organization, worried about an increasing epidemic of drug-resistant infections, has thrown its considerable weight behind the campaign to cut the use of antibiotics in pigs, chickens and cattle that are raised for their meat," Dan Charles reports for NPR. "The WHO is calling on governments to follow the example of Denmark and the Netherlands, which have banned the use of these drugs to make animals grow faster, or simply to protect healthy animals from getting sick."

Antimicrobials are sometimes overused or misused in treating human sickness, but the amount of antibiotics used on farms is usually far greater. In its new guidelines, the WHO asks farmers not to use antibiotics to promote faster growth or prevent disease in healthy animals. Veterinarians are asked to avoid using antibiotics that are most critical in human health. And it asks governments to not allow any new antibiotics discovered in the future to be used on animals.

The National Pork Producers Council "condemned the WHO's proposals to ban the use of drugs for disease prevention, and to stop using drugs that are most critical for human health. According to the NPPC, such a ban 'is antithetical to pork farmers' and veterinarians' moral obligation to care for their pigs'," Charles reports.

Fast-food chains are phasing out antibiotics in chickens, but are slow to do so in beef and pork

It's more difficult to ensure that cattle and swine are
raised without antibiotics (Tribune photo: Antonio Perez)

While major fast-food chains such as McDonald's have promised to phase out using chickens that are fed antibiotics, they have been much slower to do likewise with cows and pigs, Samantha Bomkamp reports for the Chicago Tribune. McDonald's, the world's largest burger chain, told Bomkamp it's more difficult to phase out antibiotics in beef and pork, "because it doesn't purchase the entire cow or pig as it does with chickens." The company said that limits its "ability to directly influence change."

McDonald's said it's difficult to monitor cows and pigs, because they often move from farm to farm, leading to a "lack of traceability," Bomkamp writes. Also, McDonald's "buys beef from thousands of ranches, each with an average of just 50 cows," while there are only two main U.S. suppliers of chicken. McDonald's said that with chickens, it "has a clear line of sight from farm to table."

McDonald's also claimed "it could see meat shortages if it moves too quickly to antibiotic-free pork and beef," Bomkamp reports. "While chicken are slaughtered in just weeks, cattle can be two years old when they go to market, leaving far more time in which an animal can get sick. That raises the likelihood that a farmer would need to use antibiotics, even if they weren't using them routinely in the animal's feed as is commonplace in many industrial farms."

According to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration "more than 70 percent of antibiotics important to human medicine in the U.S. are sold for livestock use," Bomkamp writes. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the World Health Organization "have said the overuse of antibiotics has led to a global health crisis because the more people are exposed to them, the less effective they are."

KFC to stop using chickens with antibiotics by 2018; farmers will need to raise more chickens

Kentucky Fried Chicken announced today that it will stop using chickens that contain antibiotics by the end of 2018, Zlati Meyer reports for USA Today. "Other quick-service chains, such as Chipotle, McDonald's, Burger King, Panera and Wendy's, have made similar pledges to eliminate antibiotics in their chicken. But KFC said it believes it is on the cutting edge in trying to go without antibiotics when it comes to on-the-bone chicken."

KFC, which works with more than 2,000 farms in a dozen states, said the change won't result in higher prices at its 4,200 U.S. outlets, but it will require growers to "raise more chickens in order to meet KFC's size demands without the antibiotics," Meyer writes. "KFC also recently pledged to eliminate artificial colors and flavors from all of its core products by the end of 2018 and to have 100 percent of the menu, except for drinks and third-party products, free of food dyes by the end of this year."

30-50% of prescribed antibiotics not needed, CDC says; food giants vow to phase out use on poultry

At least 30 percent of antibiotics prescribed in 2014 in U.S. doctor's offices, hospital clinics and emergency departments were unnecessary, says a study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The study found that "total inappropriate antibiotic use, inclusive of unnecessary use and inappropriate selection, dosing and duration, may approach 50 percent of all outpatient antibiotic use."

During the study year 266 million courses of antibiotics were dispensed to outpatients in U.S. community pharmacies, or five prescriptions for every six people, CDC says. (CDC map: Outpatient antibiotic prescriptions per 1,000 people in 2014)

Researchers from Australia's Bond University asked parents of children 12 and younger when it was appropriate to use antibiotics for common upper respiratory illnesses. They found that doctors often prescribe unnecessary antibiotics for children to placate worried parents of "just in case," reports Teresa Carr of Consumer Reports magazine. Doctors want high satisfaction ratings from patients, according to a 2014 survey of 155 doctors by researchers at the University of Wisconsin and Rogers Memorial Hospital in Oconomowoc, Wis. "Almost half the physicians believed that the pressure to obtain better scores prompted inappropriate prescribing, including unnecessary prescriptions for antibiotics," Carr writes.

There's another side to the issue that needs more attention – the misuse and overuse of antibiotics on livestock and poultry, Ben Chandler, president and CEO of the Foundation for a Healthy Kentucky, writes for The Courier-Journal in Louisville. (Kentucky ranks first in per-capita antibiotic prescriptions.)

Chandler notes that 70 percent of antibiotics considered important to human medicine in the U.S. "are for use on food producing animals. Typically, the drugs are given to animals on a routine basis – even if they aren't sick – to promote growth and to compensate for crowded unsanitary conditions. That practice turns farms into breeding grounds for antibiotic-resistant bacteria that cab travel off the farms and into our communities."

Tyson Foods, the world's largest meat company by revenue, and Perdue Farms are transitioning away from antibiotic use in their branded chickens, Chandler notes. Fast-food industry leaders including "McDonald's, Subway, Chick-fil-A, Wendy's, Chipotle, and Taco Bell have made various commitments to phase out of the routine use of antibiotics from the chicken supply chain. Subway's commitment was for all meats."

Some experts remain skeptical that new rules for antibiotics in animals will reduce use

New federal guidelines for use of antibiotics in animals, which take effect Jan. 1, may not reduce their use, reports Amy Mayer of Iowa Public Radio after interviewing farmers and agriculture experts.

Under the new rules, "all antibiotics important for human health" must be obtained with written permission from a veterinarian, "similar to a prescription," Mayer notes. "In the past, farmers could buy feed containing antibiotics at the local feed store without even consulting a vet. Now, they can't." One rule requires such vets to visit the farm and be familiar with its operations.

"Some public health officials, doctors and politicians have questioned whether the rules will bring about any meaningful changes," Mayer reports, quoting James Johnson, an infectious-disease doctor at the University of Minnesota: "I frankly am skeptical that we're going to see any drop in amount of drug used or any big shift in which particular drugs are used."

The rules are aimed at stemming the trend of bacteria that develop resistance to antibiotics. "It's very clear that these high-antibiotic use, intensive animal operations are great breeding grounds for resistant bacteria," Johnson told Mayer, who adds: "Johnson also recognizes agriculture's argument that there's limited data definitively linking on-farm antibiotic use to resistant infections in humans. The FDA declined to explain just how its new rules will reduce antibiotic resistance. But, in a written statement, told Iowa Public Radio that it's expanding its data collection on the sale and distribution of antibiotics in hopes of better studying the link between farm use and resistance."