Beruflich Dokumente
Kultur Dokumente
Straight talk about antibiotic use in food animal production presented by ALPHARMA Inc., Animal Health
T
The founder of USA Today, the “first news- Also in
paper for the television era,” once famously this issue
advised a junior editor that if he was going to ● How important
print a picture of an attractive young woman is the farmer’s
on his front page, it was imperative to make use of
sure he positioned the marketable points of antibiotics in
female anatomy above the fold. contributing to
The health-reporting counterpart of that the creation of
news-desk gem of wisdom occurred in Octo- MRSA?
ber, when the CDC chose to announce an ● Following the
increase in the number of people killed by European ban
drug-resistant forms of the bacterium Staphylo- on low-level
coccus aureus, or MRSA, by proclaiming it now antibiotic use,
killed more Americans than AIDS. guess which
It was a masterful stroke of PR analogizing, greed and gullibility in insisting on feeding direction MRSA
ensuring the quote would be introduced into animals and birds antibiotics. has trended?
virtually every news story about the subject. Faithful critic of farm antibiotic use, Dr. ● Surveillance
Other outlets picked up and expanded the Margaret Mellon of the activist Union of Con- data call into
theme, from the obligatory “[Insert City Here] cerned Scientists, accused government of turn- question the
Teenager Infected with MRSA” headlines, to ing a blind eye to MRSA for fear it would alleged link
most notably the Baltimore Sun, which jumped disrupt a system that “ensures [animals] will between
on the occasion of a research study that found get sick and therefore need to be treated.” resistant
a sampling of Canadian pigs carried MRSA, Berkeley journalism prof turned new-age food bacteria in
to again point an accusatory finger at farmer guru Michael Pollan turned out to hawk his animals and
new book by predicting (non-existent) science in humans.
WHERE MRSA OCCURS implicating use of swine antibiotics in MRSA
would force us all back to a kinder, gentler way
Of 94,360 Americans CDC estimates of growing food. And the Boston Globe edito-
developed serious MRSA in 2005, the rialists may have written the sentence voted
majority were related to health care settings. most likely to never let fact stand in the way
Not associated with healthcare of a good story when they opined, “Research-
setting 14% ers have not yet proven that indiscriminate
Hospital-
associated antibiotic use has caused the MRSA..., but the
cases study should bolster support for the bill backed For the record...
Occurred by Senator Edward Kennedy and others that
in hospital Activists churned
Associated 33% would require the phasing out of the nonthera- the media in 2007
with
healthcare peutic use of antibiotics in farm animals.” with claims that
85% While the media repeats the activist line that farm antibiotic use
Occurred “use of antibiotics in animal feed has to be con- was causing the
outside
All hospital sidered suspect until proved otherwise,” cooler new superbug
MRSA 66% heads were suggesting we look before we leap. MRSA to spread.
cases MRSA is an important problem, but many of The fiction needs
the pronouncements making it above the fold some balance
Source: Journal of the American Medical Association, 2007.
on the story don’t bear up to fact. See inside. with a little fact.
‘With a single beyond its traditional hospital confines, into Nelson, University of information campaign to remind
exception, no one young people, immunocompromised patients, Kentucky infectious consumers the best defense
prisoners and contact athletes, has also been diseases specialist, told against MRSA, typically contracted
has demonstrated recognized for more than a decade. The one the Lexington Herald- through a break in the skin, has
MRSA causes pig apparently new aspect is the identification of a Leader. “Some articles less to do with food than it does
new strain that has been isolated in Dutch and have made it sound like with simply washing your hands.
disease’ Canadian pork operations. people are going to die
from this because we don’t have anything left to treat
FICTION. MRSA is a superbug. it with. But there are several drugs we can use to treat
FACT. Last year’s “Mersaphobia” resulted from a per- these infections, and they’re very effective.”
fect storm of the CDC announcement, the European
organic association proclaiming the “monster” bug had FICTION. MRSA comes from pig farms.
entered the food chain, and reports of a few rare deaths FACT. Studies in 2007 reported finding MRSA in
in U.S. youngsters attributed to the bacteria. It resulted pets, food animals and farmers, most notably in swine
in school closings, calls for legislation to track hospital operations in the Netherlands, Germany, Denmark and
cleanliness, even angry parents storming one school to Canada. The study that was most widely churned by
rescue their kids after learning a teacher carried MRSA. the activist coalition seeking an end to farm antibiotic
Now, even CDC is seeking a little public calm. use sampled 285 pigs of three different age groups
More evidence it’s dangerous to make simple assumptions about source and spread
When the authors of the widely they recognized a critical issue infected with MRSA if a member
reported Canadian pig study microbiologists have warned about of the household in which they
noted “It is likely that [one MRSA regarding antibiotic resistance: You lived worked for the National
strain] colonization in pigs orig- can’t assume it’s always being Health Service. And another study
inated from colonized humans,” passed from animals to humans. found most of the MRSA isolated
In fact, it’s not clear whether from dogs, personnel and environ-
the growing problem of MRSA mental surfaces of United King-
in pets is a case of pets giving dom veterinary teaching hospitals
MRSA to their owners, vice- were either identical or closely
versa, or a combination of related to the most common
both. strains in human hospitals.
Transfer of MRSA from As the Institute of Food Tech-
humans to animals has been nologists warned in its 2006
documented in teaching clinics review of antibiotic resistance in
treating horses. A 2006 British the food chain, the system is
study showed dogs were sig- highly complex, and antibiotic
nificantly more likely to be resistance passes at many points.