Antibiotics: Feinstein bill seeks to protect humans

Mon, 20 Jun 2011 13:53:59 GMT

The SFMS developed policy to curtail overuse of antibiotics in agriculture in 2002, and had that policy adopted by the AMA. We have worked with Senator Feinstein on this topic in more recent years, and she has now taken on a leadership role. Washington—California Sen. Dianne Feinstein renewed a decade-long push Friday to phase out the routine use of antibiotics in livestock, hogs and poultry. Her bill follows the emergence in Germany of a lethal antibiotic-resistant strain of E. coli linked to 35 food-poisoning deaths and the discovery this month in Britain of an antibiotic-resistant bacteria in cow’s milk. Government officials have warned that increasing antibiotic resistance in humans poses a serious public health threat. In the United States, the Food and Drug Administration has confirmed that 80 percent of all antibiotics are given to farm animals in low doses intended to stave off disease in large livestock operations. The full article can be found at http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/06/18/MNT91JVE15.DTL.

San Francisco Medical Society Blog

Antibiotics: Feinstein bill seeks to protect humans