FDA to Limit Antibiotics Use in Farm Animals

Concerns of overuse creating resistant strains

As experts continue to sound alarm bells about the rising resistance of microbes to antibiotics used by humans, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration on Wednesday announced it was curbing the use of the drugs in livestock nationwide.

"FDA is issuing a plan today, in collaboration with the animal health industry, to phase out the use of medically important [for treating human infections] antimicrobials in food animals for production purposes, such as to enhance growth rates and improve feeding efficiency," Michael Taylor, deputy commissioner for foods and veterinary medicine at the agency, said during a Wednesday morning press briefing.

Experts have long stressed that the overuse of antibiotics by the meat and poultry industry gives dangerous germs such as Staphylococcus and C. difficile a prime breeding ground to develop mutations around drugs often used by humans. But for years, millions of doses of antibiotics have been added to the feed or water of cattle, poultry, hogs and other animals to produce fatter animals while using less feed.