FDA’s Gutless Refusal to Ban or Limit Antibiotics in Factory Farms

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA), in thrall to Agribusiness and Big Pharma, has again refused to protect the public’s health. Quietly, right before Christmas, when attention is generally focused elsewhere, they reneged on their promise to ban the use of antibiotics in agribusiness, not even opting to limit the practice.

The decision wasn’t announced on the FDA’s website. You have to go to the Federal Register to find the announcement, such as it is. In fact, its title, “Withdrawal of Notices of Opportunity for a Hearing: Penicillin and Tetracycline Used in Animal Feed“, doesn’t state exactly what they’ve done.

To be specific, the FDA has decided not to:

…withdraw certain approved uses of penicillin and tetracyclines intended for use in feeds for food-producing animals based in part on microbial food safety concern. FDA is taking this action, and closing the corresponding dockets, because : FDA is engaging in other ongoing regulatory strategies developed since the publication of the 1977 NOOHs with respect to addressing microbial food safety issues.

In other words, the FDA claims that it has other methods in planning for regulation of antibiotics in animal feed. But do they?

The Phony Plan

In fact, the answer is a resounding No! Unless you consider so-called voluntary compliance on the part of Agribusiness to be legitimate. But no one who has actually followed how Agribusiness routinely evades and outright ignores regulations could possibly suggest that there is one iota of legitimacy in the FDA’s gutless stance.

The development of drug resistant superbugs doesn’t matter to the FDA. The agency simply responds to its Agribusiness and Big Pharma masters. Could there be any doubt that they own the agency?

FDA’s So-Called Leadership

Like other political figures, the FDA Commissioner, Margaret Hamburg, entered office on statements propounding good policies. In fact, in 2003 she co-authored a book, Microbial Threats to Health: Emergence, Detection, and Response that acknowledges the issue with this statement on page 221:

As previously noted, agricultural practices have been closely linked to the spread of antibiotic resistance, influenza outbreaks, and diseases of food crops and animals.

The head of the FDA, a person who could have stopped this travesty, is fully aware of the implications. Yet, she allowed the withdrawal of any consideration to regulate, let alone ban, the routine use of antibiotics in livestock.

According to Michael Pollan, as quoted in the Guardian:

When Margaret Hamburg became the head of the FDA, she indicated this [banning antibiotics in livestock feed] was a high priority for them and that she realised how much of a problem the profligate use of antibiotics was. She said she was going to treat this issue as if her hair was on fire. This isn’t the way someone acts when their hair is on fire.

What will Margaret Hamburg’s reward be? What sort of cushy job is she going to have after her FDA tenure?

The FDA Is Fully Aware of the Implications

The FDA itself admits—and has done so for nearly four decades—that antibiotics in animal feed is a cause of drug-resistant diseases. The above-referenced ”Withdrawal of Notices of Opportunity for a Hearing: Penicillin and Tetracycline Used in Animal Feed” is full of references to its own work indicating that it knows. The purpose is to convince us that they’re committed to eliminating the routine use of antibiotics in livestock. It’s doublespeak and innuendo, with no reality behind it. If the FDA intended to eliminate the use of antibiotics in livestock, they’d do so, but that’s precisely what they’re refusing to do.

The last year has given us recall after recall of meat contaminated with drug-resistant bacteria. The FDA is supposedly tasked with preventing such problems. Instead, the pace is accelerating and the methods to be employed will likely worsen the problem by limiting the ability of small producers to survive. That will leave us to the utter lack of mercy shown by Agribusiness. Unless you can manage to produce your own meat, you’ll either go meatless or risk the contaminated junk that Agribusiness produces.

According to Congresswoman Louise Slaughter, 100,000 people a year die of drug-resistant diseases in the United States. That number keeps increasing, and it doesn’t include the thousands who are permanently maimed by these infections. As Slaughter asks:

I wonder how many lives could have been saved if these proposals were adopted in 1977 as they should have been.

Clearly, the FDA values Agribusiness and Big Pharma profits over the health of citizens.

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