Antibiotics in Agriculture: Is it non-compliance or overuse?

Antibiotic-resistant illnesses in humans are mostly caused by the medical use of antibiotics, but it is also recognized that humans can get antibiotic resistance genes from a range of animal sources, such as farm animals, pets, and wildlife.

 

There are three possible ways that the use of antibiotics in agriculture could cause illness in humans: One of three scenarios involves direct animal-to-human transmission of resistant bacteria; another involves species barrier breaches that allow resistant strains from livestock to spread over time to humans; and a third involves the transfer of resistance genes from agriculture to human infections.

 

In all three situations, there is evidence of resistance being transferred from animals to people, although the extent is either small or it is difficult to determine the exact cause. According to Chang et al. (2014), the subject of antibiotic use in agriculture is complicated. As we mentioned, a lot of people think that antibiotics used in agriculture pose a serious risk to human health.

 

Although there is cause for alarm, it's possible that the problem's scope has been overstated. We shouldn't let the lack of proof that agriculture is "primarily to blame" for the rise in resistance strains divert us from our efforts to guarantee prudent use of antibiotics in all contexts, clinical care being the most crucial."

Antimicrobial resistance has been dubbed "an increasingly serious threat to global public health that requires action across all government sectors and society" by the World Health Organization.

Approximately 70% of the antibiotics sold in the US are "medically important," meaning they come from classes that are significant to human medicine, while 80% of them are sold for use in animal husbandry.

In order to prevent illnesses and somewhat boost growth rates, animals are fed antibiotics; throughout the next 15 years, it is anticipated that this practice will significantly expand globally. There is mounting evidence that the widespread use of nontherapeutic antibiotics in animals contributes to human antibiotic resistance. Humans can contract resistant bacteria by coming into close contact with animals, eating undercooked meat, coming into contact with raw meat, or coming into contact with surfaces that have come into contact with meat.

 

Pathogens on food are another source of antibiotic-resistant bacterium exposure for humans. Specifically, resistant bacteria can cause infections that are unpleasant enough on their own, but can be even more difficult to treat if they are severe enough to need antibiotic treatment and also resistant to commonly used antibiotics. This is especially true if resistant bacteria are consumed by humans through food and subsequently colonize the gut. Among the most prevalent foodborne bacteria are Campylobacter, Salmonella, E. Coli, and Listeria species.

 

Each year, nearly 400,000 Americans become ill with antibiotic-resistant infections due to infections caused by Campylobacter and Salmonella alone. Among the most prevalent foods that can include infections that are both susceptible to and resistant to antibiotics are dairy products, ground minced beef, and poultry. Enterobacteriaceae have been discovered through surveillance of retail meats, including turkey, chicken, pig, and cattle. Although some research has linked antibiotic-resistant illnesses to animals that produce food, other studies, especially those that look at plasmid-mediated resistance, have had difficulty establishing a causal relationship.

 

 Common sense measures like pasteurization, which involves properly preparing and cooking meat, food preservation techniques, and thorough hand washing can help get rid of, reduce, or stop the spread of these and other potentially dangerous bacteria.

 

If antibiotics were not frequently effective in treating bacterial diseases, it would have a devastating effect on both the status of public health and medical practice. In an effort to curb the possibility for antibiotic resistance, doctors and healthcare facilities are frequently advised not to treat patients needlessly or insufficiently, and prescription antibiotics are being closely monitored as part of antimicrobial stewardship initiatives. However, another significant source of antibiotic resistance that needs to be tackled is the inappropriate usage of antibiotics in animals.

 

The misuse of antibiotics in food animals contributes to the higher expense of treating diseases in humans that are resistant to antibiotics to the extent that this overuse exacerbates resistance issues. The Infectious Diseases Society of America estimates that treating antibiotic resistance with lengthier and more costly hospital stays costs the US health care system between $21 and $34 billion a year, not to mention eight million more hospital days.

 

The growing problem of antibiotic resistance is a result of both human and animal overuse and misuse of antibiotics. There are very few promising choices in the research pipeline, and several species of bacteria that cause serious infections in humans have already developed resistance to most or all of the available medicines.

 

“According to WHO Director-General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, "a shortage of effective antibiotics poses as serious a threat to national security as an unexpected and deadly disease outbreak." "To stop the spread of antibiotic resistance and keep the world safe, we must take strong, consistent action in all sectors."

 

Informed directly by a systematic study that was just published in The Lancet Planetary Health, treatments that limit antibiotic usage in animals raised for food have been shown to lower antibiotic-resistant bacteria in these animals by as much as 39%.

The World Health Organization (WHO) strongly advises against using any kind of medically significant antibiotic in animals raised for food, even when it comes to growth promotion and disease prevention in the absence of a diagnosis. Antibiotics should only be given to healthy animals in order to prevent sickness if the illness has been identified in other members of the same flock, herd, or fish population.

 

Sick animals should be examined whenever feasible to identify the safest and most appropriate antibiotic to treat their particular ailment. The WHO's list of "least important" antibiotics for human health should be utilized for choosing antibiotics for animal use, not the list of "highest priority critically important" antibiotics. When it comes to treating severe bacterial infections in humans, these antibiotics are frequently the final resort or one of the few options.

 

"There is scientific proof that excessive usage of antibiotics in animals can lead to the development of antibiotic resistance," states Dr. Kazuaki Miyagishima, WHO Director of Food Safety and Zoonoses. "The increasing demand for foods of animal origin, which are frequently produced through intensive animal husbandry, is driving up the volume of antibiotics used in animals worldwide."

 

A lot of nations have already made steps to cut back on the use of antibiotics in animals raised for food. For instance, the European Union forbade the use of antibiotics to promote growth starting in 2006. The desire for meat produced without the regular use of antibiotics is also being driven by consumers, as seen by the adoption of "antibiotic-free" policies by several large food chains for their meat supply.

 

Vaccination effectiveness can be increased, animal housing and husbandry techniques can be altered, and better hygiene can be implemented as alternatives to using antibiotics to prevent disease in animals.

 

Researchers are searching for alternatives to using antibiotics in livestock as a result of growing concern over the rise of antibiotic-resistant bacteria.

 

Probiotics are being researched in cattle as a way to improve productivity. Probiotics are cultures of one type of bacteria or a combination of strains.

 

 

Non-digestible carbohydrates are called prebiotics. Oligosaccharides, which are shortened chains of monosaccharides, make up the majority of carbohydrates. Mannanoligosaccharides (MOS) and fructooligosaccharides (FOS) are the two prebiotics that are most frequently researched. The use of FOS in chicken feed has been researched. Bacteria attach to MOS instead of the intestine and are transported out, acting as a competitive binding site.

 

Bacteriophages have been investigated, are easily discovered in most bacterially populated habitats, and have the ability to infect the majority of bacteria.

Probiotics, competitive exclusion, enzymes, immunomodulators, and organic acids have all been shown in another study to stop the spread of germs and can be used in place of antibiotics. Bacteriocins, antimicrobial peptides, and bacteriophages were effective tools that another research team used to manage bacterial infections. While further investigation is required in this area, other strategies for successfully managing bacterial infections in animals have been found.

 

Other options include keeping the animals healthy through preventative measures, which will lessen the need for antibiotics. These include enhancing the living circumstances for animals, boosting biosecurity, promoting better nutrition and natural immunity, putting better management and hygiene practices into place, and making sure vaccinations are used more effectively.

Further Reading

 

• Ahmed, A. A., H. Osman, A. M. Mansour, H. A. Musa, A. B. Ahmed, Z. Karrar, and H. S. Hassan, 2000: Antimicrobial agent resistance in bacterial isolates from patients with diarrhea and urinary tract infection in the Sudan. Am. J. Trop. Med. Hyg. 63, 259–263.
• Awad, A., I. Eltayeb, L. Matowe, and L. Thalib, 2005: Self-medication with antibiotics and antimalarials in the community of Khartoum State, Sudan. J. Pharm. Pharm. Sci. 8, 326–331.
• Cars, O., L. D. Hogberg, M. Murray, O. Nordberg, S. Sivaraman, C. S. Lundborg, A. D. So, and G. Tomson, 2008: Meeting the challenge of antibiotic resistance. BMJ 337, a1438.
• Collignon, P., 2009: The use of antibiotics in food production animals; does this cause human health problems? Available at: http://www.rspca.org.au/assets/files/Science/SciSem2009/seminars09_paper_collignon.pdf (accessed February 24, 2009).
• Dahlberg, K., N. Drew, and M. Nyström, 2001: Reflective Life-world Research. Student literature, Lund.
• Darko, G., and S. O. Acquaah, 2008: Levels of organochlorine pesticides residues in dairy products in Kumasi, Ghana. Chemosphere 71, 294–298.
• El Zubeir, I. E. M., P. Kutzer, and O. A. O. E. L. Owni, 2006: Frequencies and antibiotic susceptibility patterns of bacteria causing mastitis among cows and their environment in Khartoum State. Res. J. Microbiol. 1, 101–109.
• El-Siddig, K., J. Gebauer, D. H. Dawoud, and A. Buerkert, 1997: The Status of Urban and Peri-Urban Agriculture in Khartoum State. Organic Agricultural Sciences Kassel University, Germany. Available at: http://www.tropentag.de/2006/abstracts/posters/461.pdf (accessed February 12, 2007).
• Graneheim, U. H., and B. Lundman, 2004: Qualitative content analysis in nursing research: concepts, procedures and measures to achieve trustworthiness. Nurse Educ. Today 24, 105–112.
• Younes, M., and B. Abela-Ridder, 2011: Strong Intersectoral Partnerships in Health: Managing Zoonotic Public Health Risks at the Human-Animal-Ecosystem Interface. World Health Organization. Available at: (accessed April 18, 2011).
• Zubeir, I. E., T. Kanbar, J. Alber, C. Lammler, O. Akineden, R. Weiss, and M. Zschock, 2007: Phenotypic and genotypic characteristics of methicillin/oxacillin-resistant Staphylococcus intermedius isolated from clinical specimens during routine veterinary