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- Subject: CDINFO: hidden costs of animal factories
- From: Ed Janzen <janzene@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sat, 1 Apr 2000 17:22:03 -0600
>--- rachel@xxxxxxxxxx wrote:
>> Date: Fri, 10 Mar 2000 17:51:29 -0500 (EST)
>> To: rachel-weekly@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>> Subject: Rachel #690: HIDDEN COSTS OF ANIMAL
>> FACTORIES
>> From: rachel@xxxxxxxxxx
>> Reply-to: rachel@xxxxxxxxxx
>>
>> =======================Electronic
>> Edition========================
>> .
>> .
>> . RACHEL'S ENVIRONMENT & HEALTH
>> WEEKLY #690 .
>> . ---March 9, 2000---
>> .
>> . HEADLINES:
>> .
>> . HIDDEN COSTS OF ANIMAL
>> FACTORIES .
>> . ==========
>> .
>> . Environmental Research
>> Foundation .
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>=================================================================
>>
>>
>> HIDDEN COSTS OF ANIMAL FACTORIES
>>
>> As the U.S. discards its family farms and in
>> their place erects
>> factory farms, we might consider the costs.
>> Here we will consider
>> only one cost: the harm to human health from
>> increased use of
>> antibiotics in confined livestock operations,
>> sometimes known as
>> animal factories.
>>
>> As most people know, modern animal factories in
>> the U.S. now
>> raise tens of thousands of chickens, cattle and
>> pigs in the
>> smallest possible space. The animals are
>> physically close to each
>> other -- jammed together might be a better
>> description -- so an
>> outbreak of disease can pass readily from
>> animal to animal. To
>> prevent this from happening -- and to promote
>> rapid growth -- the
>> animals are regularly treated with antibiotics.
>>
>> The Institute of Medicine, a division of the
>> National Academy of
>> Sciences, began to question this practice in
>> 1989.[1] The
>> Institute identified a hazard to human health:
>> the creation of
>> antibiotic-resistant bacteria which can cause
>> serious human
>> diseases.
>>
>> Resistance is a well-understood phenomenon. Not
>> all bacteria are
>> affected equally by antibiotics -- some
>> bacteria are genetically
>> able to resist the killing effects of an
>> antibiotic. As a result,
>> when a group of bacteria is dosed with an
>> antibiotic, some hardy
>> bacteria survive. These resistant bacteria
>> reproduce and the next
>> time they are dosed with the same antibiotic, a
>> hardy few survive
>> again. Eventually, the only surviving bacteria
>> are immune to that
>> particular antibiotic. They have developed
>> "resistance," and that
>> antibiotic has lost its effectiveness against
>> those bacteria. As
>> time passes, some bacteria can develop
>> resistance to multiple
>> antibiotics and these are referred to as
>> "multi-drug-resistant
>> strains." Such multi-drug-resistant bacteria
>> are a serious
>> medical concern because they may cause diseases
>> that are
>> difficult or impossible to cure, the Institute
>> of Medicine said
>> in 1992.[2,pg.92]
>>
>> Some of the costs of antibiotic-resistant
>> bacteria were
>> summarized by the Institute of Medicine:
>>
>> "An increasingly important contributor to the
>> emergence of
>> microbial threats to health is drug
>> [antibiotic] resistance.
>> Microbes that once were easily controlled by
>> antimicrobial drugs
>> are, more and more often, causing infections
>> that no longer
>> respond to treatment with these
>> drugs."[2,pg.92]
>>
>> The Institute went on to outline the human
>> costs of
>> antibiotic-resistant germs: "Treating resistant
>> infections
>> requires the use of more expensive or more
>> toxic alternative
>> drugs and longer hospital stays; in addition,
>> it frequently means
>> a higher risk of death for the patient
>> harboring a resistant
>> pathogen. Estimates of the cost of antibiotic
>> resistance in the
>> United States annually range as high as $30
>> billion. Even with
>> the continuing development of new drugs,
>> resistance to
>> antibiotics is an increasingly important
>> problem with certain
>> bacterial pathogens."[2,pg.93]
>>
>> The Institute laid the problem squarely on the
>> doorstep of animal
>> factories: "New agricultural procedures can
>> also have
>> unanticipated microbiological effects. For
>> example, the
>> introduction of feedlots and large-scale
>> poultry rearing and
>> processing facilities has been implicated in
>> the increasing
>> incidence of human pathogens, such as
>> SALMONELLA, in domestic
>> animals over the past 30 years. The use of
>> antibiotics to enhance
>> the growth of and prevent illness in domestic
>> animals has been
>> questioned because of its potential role in the
>> development and
>> dissemination of antibiotic resistance.
>> Approximately half the
>> tonnage of antibiotics produced in the U.S. is
>> used in the
>> raising of animals for human consumption. Thus,
>> concerns about
>> the selection of antibiotic-resistant strains
>> of bacteria and
>> their passage into the human population as a
>> result of this
>> excessive use of antibiotics are
>> realistic."[2,pg.64]
>>
>> Throughout the 1990s, awareness of this problem
>> has been growing.
>>
>> In May 1998, the federal Centers for Disease
>> Control and
>> Prevention reported in the NEW ENGLAND JOURNAL
>> OF MEDICINE that a
>> strain of salmonella bacteria had emerged in
>> the U.S. in the last
>> 5 years which is resistant to 5 different
>> antibiotics.[3] Called
>> typhimurium DT 104, this rapidly-emerging
>> bacterium is
>> responsible for an estimated 68,000 to 340,000
>> illnesses each
>> year in the U.S. The proportion of salmonella
>> infections caused
>> by typhimurium DT 104 increased 30-fold in the
>> U.S. between 1980
>> and 1996.
>>
>> The Centers for Disease Control blamed the
>> rapid emergence of
>> this infectious agent on the use of antibiotics
>> in livestock,
>> summarizing its recommendations this way: "More
>> prudent use of
>> antimicrobial agents [antibiotics] in farm
>> animals and more
>> effective disease prevention on farms are
>> necessary to reduce the
>> dissemination of multi-drug-resistant
>> typhimurium DT 104 and to
>> slow the emergence of resistance to additional
>> agents in this and
>> other strains of salmonella."[3]
>>
>> In March of 1999 the FDA began a multi-year
>> process to regulate
>> the use of antibiotics in farm animals. Here is
>> how the NEW YORK
>> TIMES reported the FDA's action in a front-page
>> story March 8:
>>
>> "Faced with mounting evidence that the routine
>> use of antibiotics
>> in livestock may diminish the drugs' power to
>> cure infections in
>> people, the Food and Drug Administra- tion has
>> begun a major
>> revision of its guidelines for approving new
>> antibiotics for
>> animals and for monitoring the effects of old
>> ones.
>>
>> "The goal of the revision is to minimize the
>> emergence of
>> bacterial strains that are resistant to
>> antibiotics, which makes
>> them difficult or even impossible to kill.
>> Drug-resis- tant
>> infections, some fatal, have been increasing in
>> people in the
>> United States, and many scientists attribute
>> the prob- lem to the
>> misuse of antibiotics in both humans and ani-
>> mals.
>>
>> "Of particular concern to scientists are recent
>> studies showing
>> bacteria in chickens that are resistant to
>> fluoroqui- nolones,
>> the most recently approved class of antibiotics
>> and one that
>> scientists had been hoping would remain
>> effective for a long
>> time."[4]
>>
>> The NEW YORK TIMES then described[4] the May,
>> 1998, study by the
>> federal Centers for Disease Control,[3] adding
>> new information
>> from an interview with Dr. Fred Angulo, one of
>> the authors of the
>> study:
>>
>> "Last May, a team from the centers reported in
>> the New England
>> Journal of Medicine that the prevalence of a
>> salmonella strain
>> resistant to five different antibiotics
>> increased from 0.6
>> percent of all specimens from around the
>> country tested by the
>> centers in 1980 to 34 percent in 1996.
>>
>> "Similarly, drug resistance in campylobacter
>> bacteria rose from
>> zero in 1991 to 13 percent in 1997 and 14
>> percent in 1998, said
>> Dr. Fred Angulo, an epidemiologist in the food-
>> borne and
>> diarrheal disease branch at the centers. He
>> said epidemiologists
>> had been alarmed by the campylobacter figures,
>> because the
>> resistance was to fluoroquinolones, the very
>> drugs the F.D.A. was
>> trying hardest to preserve.
>>
>> "Dr. Angulo said that he and his colleagues had
>> attribut- ed much
>> of the increase in fluoroquinolone resistance
>> to the drug
>> agency's approval of the drugs to treat a
>> respiratory infection
>> in chickens in 1995. It was an approval that
>> the disease control
>> centers opposed, because it would lead to tens
>> of thousands of
>> the birds being treated at one time.
>>
>> "Dr. Angulo said he thought the rising levels
>> of resis- tance in
>> bacteria taken from sick people had been caused
>> by the heavy use
>> of antibiotics in livestock. 'Public health is
>> united in the
>> conclusion,' he said. 'There is no controversy
>> about where
>> antibiotic resis- tance in food-borne pathogens
>> comes from.'"[4]
>>
>> Two months later, in May, 1999, a report by the
>> Minnesota Health
>> Department, published in the NEW ENGLAND
>> JOURNAL OF MEDICINE,
>> found that infections by antibiotic-resistant
>> bacteria increased
>> nearly 8-fold between 1992 and 1997. Part of
>> the increase was
>> linked to foreign travel, and part of the
>> increase was linked to
>> the use of antibiotics in chickens. Even the
>> increase due to
>> foreign travel may have been caused by the use
>> of antibiotics in
>> chickens in countries such as Mexico where the
>> use of antibiotics
>> in poultry has quadrupled in recent years, the
>> report said.[5]
>> The study's lead author, Dr. Kirk E. Smith,
>> told the Associated
>> Press, "There is definitely a public health
>> problem with using
>> quinolone [antibiotic] in poultry, and we need
>> to take a hard
>> look at that."[6]
>>
>> In November 1999 a new report appeared in the
>> NEW ENGLAND JOURNAL
>> OF MEDICINE linking an outbreak of fatal
>> salmonella in Denmark to
>> the use of antibiotics in pigs.[7] Here is how
>> the NEW YORK TIMES
>> reported the story:
>>
>> "An outbreak of severe, drug-resistant
>> salmonella infections in
>> 27 people in Denmark, traced to meat from
>> infected pigs, is being
>> described by American scientists as a warning
>> on what can happen
>> in the United States unless steps are taken to
>> limit the use of
>> antibiotics in farm animals.
>>
>> "The episode in Denmark, in which 11 people
>> were hospitalized and
>> 2 of them died, is especially worrisome because
>> the bacteria had
>> made them partly resistant to a class of
>> antibiotics called
>> fluoroquinolones that doctors had considered
>> one of their most
>> powerful weapons against severe cases of
>> salmonella and other
>> bacteria that infect the intestinal tract. If
>> those bacteria
>> invade the bloodstream, which occurs in 3
>> percent to 10 percent
>> of salmonella cases, the illness can be fatal.
>>
>> "'Fluoroquinolones become a drug of last resort
>> for some of these
>> infections,' said Dr. Stuart Levy, director of
>> the Center for
>> Adaptation Genetics and Drug Resistance at
>> Tufts University. 'If
>> we're beginning to lose these drugs, where do
>> we go from here?'
>>
>> "Fluoroquinolones are the most recently
>> approved class of
>> antibiotics; nothing comparable is expected to
>> become available
>> for several years," the Times said.[8]
>>
>> Deaths due to infectious diseases have been
>> increasing in the
>> U.S. in recent years. In the '50s and '60s,
>> public health
>> specialists were predicting that infectious
>> diseases would
>> disappear as a problem. However, this
>> prediction was entirely
>> wrong. According to a 1996 report in the
>> JOURNAL OF THE AMERICAN
>> MEDICAL ASSOCIATION, between 1980 and 1992, the
>> death rate due to
>> infectious diseases as the underlying cause of
>> death increased
>> 58%, from 41 to 65 per 100,000 population in
>> the U.S. (See REHW
>> 528.) Some of this was due to an increase in
>> AIDS during the
>> period. However, AIDS is typically a disease of
>> young people.
>> Among those aged 65 and over, deaths due to
>> infectious diseases
>> increased 25% during the period 1980-1992 (from
>> 271 deaths per
>> 100,000 to 338 deaths per 100,000). Thus there
>> seems to have been
>> a real and substantial increase in deaths due
>> to infectious
>> diseases in the U.S. during the past 20
>> years.[9]
>>
>> In sum, serious infectious diseases are
>> enjoying a resurgence in
>> the U.S. Our national policy of replacing
>> family farms with
>> animal factories in the name of "economic
>> efficiency" is one of
>> the key reasons.
>>
>> =================
>> [1] Institute of Medicine, HUMAN HEALTH RISKS
>> FROM THE
>> SUBTHERAPEUTIC USE OF PENICILLIN OR
>> TETRACYCLINES IN ANIMAL FEED
>> (Washington, D.C.: National Academy Press,
>> 1989).
>>
>> [2] Institute of Medicine, EMERGING INFECTIONS:
>> MICROBIAL
>> THREATS TO HEALTH IN THE UNITED STATES
>> (Washington, D.C.:
>> National Academy Press, 1992). ISBN
>> 0-309-04741-2.
>>
>> [3] M. Kathleen Glynn and others, "Emergence of
>> Multidrug-resistant SALMONELLA ENTERICA
>> Serotype Typhimurium
>> DT104 Infections in the United States," NEW
>> ENGLAND JOURNAL OF
>> MEDICINE Vol. 338, No. 19 (May 7, 1998), pgs.
>> 1333-1338.
>>
>> [4] Denise Grady, "A Move to Limit Antibiotic
>> Use in Animal
>> Feed," NEW YORK TIMES March 8, 1999, pg. A1.
>>
>> [5] Kirk E. Smith and others,
>> "Quinolone-Resistant CAMPYLOBACTER
>> JEJUNI Infections in Minnesota, 1992-1998," NEW
>> ENGLAND JOURNAL
>> OF MEDICINE Vol. 340, No. 20 (May 20, 1999),
>> pgs. 1525-1532.
>>
>> [6] Associated Press, "U.S. Antibiotics
>> Countered by Foreign
>> Meat, Study Says," NEW YORK TIMES May 20, 1999,
>> pg. A20.
>>
>> [7] Kare Molbak and others, "An Outbreak of
>> Multidrug-Resistant,
>> Quinolone-Resistant SALMONELLA ENTERICA
>> Serotype Typhimurium
>> DT104," NEW ENGLAND JOURNAL OF MEDICINE Vol.
>> 341, No. 19
>> (November 4, 1999), pgs. 1420-1425.
>>
>> [8] Denise Grady, "Bacteria Cases in Denmark
>> Cause Antibiotic
>> Concerns in U.S.," NEW YORK TIMES November 4,
>> 1999, pg. A15.
>>
>> [9] Robert W. Pinner and others, "Trends in
>> Infectious Diseases
>> Mortality in the United States," JOURNAL OF THE
>> AMERICAN MEDICAL
>> ASSOCIATION Vol. 275, No. 3 (January 17, 1996),
>> pgs. 189-193.
>>
>> Descriptor terms: farming; animal welfare;
>> animal health;
>> poultry; swine; antibiotics; infectious
>> diseases; resistance;
>> morbidity statistics; mortality statistics;
>> confined
>> livestock operations; animal factories;
>>
>>
>################################################################
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