Antibiotics in animal feed
In humans where antibiotics are restricted as much as possible, to usage only when a person is really in need of them. The reason for this is simple, the more a particular type if antibiotic is used, the less effective it becomes over time, as the bacteria begins to become resistent to the drug.
Living in a society based on capitalism, it has been discovered that feeding animals antibiotics has other benefits:
- It speeds up the growth rate, meaning more profit can be made by producing more animals
- It allows animals to be kept in ever increasing unsanitary environments, by protecting them from illness.
Now I am not sure about you, but to me this is a failure of capitalism in that if consumers are not aware of what is going on, how can they make an informed choice about which products to buy. It seems that the large companies using these products are doing whatever they can to prevent this information being made available to the public. At the very minimum, labelling should be required on meat that is produced using antibiotics.
To me it is also a failure of government to protect its citizens by not taking action (such as requiring labeling) to prevent such activity. So much so that is left to private individuals to try and take matters into their own hands. Last week a group of people launched a civil action against the US FDA regarding this practice. Hopefully the practice will be stopped and as a result, have a flow on effect to Australia.
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