2.5 The role of antibiotics in food production
In the previous sections you learned that:
- pathogenic bacteria can cause infection in humans, animals and plants
- antibiotics are used to treat bacterial infections
- antibiotics are also used to prevent infections in patients with weakened immune systems, for example in cancer patients
Activity 11: The role of antibiotics beyond human medicine
Based on the understanding that you have now, reflect on the role that antibiotics play beyond human medicine.
What is the role of antibiotics in the production of crops?
Discussion
Bacteria and fungi cause significant plant disease and production losses worldwide. Pesticides, including antimicrobial pesticides, play an important role in reducing losses in crop production. Some of the same drugs that are used in human and veterinary medicine – for example, streptomycin, tetracyclines or triazoles – are also used to control plant diseases (FAO, 2018).
What is the role of antibiotics in food-animal production and veterinary medicine?
Discussion
In food-animal production, antibiotics are used to treat disease, prevent disease and promote growth. The rising global demand for animal-sourced food has led to more intensive, large-scale farming, with animals reared in confined spaces – often at a high density. These production systems promote pathogen spread. In some countries and production systems, prophylactic use of antibiotics to address disease problems in intensive systems is common. In other countries, industries have worked particularly hard on improving biosecurity to minimise or even completely eliminate the prophylactic use of antibiotics in food-animal production.
The use of antibiotics to promote growth in food-producing animals was common historically but is now considered inappropriate. Members of the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE) agreed in 2016 to ‘phasing out the use of antibiotics for growth promotion in the absence of risk analysis’. The latest OIE Annual Report on Antimicrobial Agents Intended for Use in Animals reported that 77% of the 118 nations that submitted data on antimicrobial use in animals responded that antimicrobials were not used for growth promotion in animals in their countries (OIE, 2020).
There is now a global consensus that the use of antibiotics for prophylaxis and growth promotion in animals should be minimised and avoided where possible. However, like humans, both food-producing and companion animals (e.g. cats, dogs and other pets) suffer from bacterial diseases that can easily be treated with antibiotics. Therefore, there will always be a role for treating individual animals therapeutically with antimicrobials. Failing to treat these animals results in unnecessary suffering (and in some cases, death), which threatens the livelihood of farmers and the welfare of animals.
There is a series of principles that can help reduce the impact of the necessary antibiotic use in animals on AMR in humans (e.g. avoiding the use of some antibiotics in animals that should be reserved for treatment of some bacterial infections in humans). These principles will be covered in the Antimicrobial stewardship in veterinary practice module
2.4 Role of antibiotics in modern medicine
