Letter received from Sen. Harkin in response to letter written to him about antibiotic use in dairy cows

Dear Friend:


I appreciate hearing your thoughts regarding The Preservation of Antibiotics for Medical Treatment Act of 2009. The discovery of antibiotics has been one of the most important advances in public health. These medicines have provided the ability to cure what were previously life-threatening diseases and have saved countless lives around the world. In addition to their uses in human medicine, antibiotics have also been successfully applied in animal agriculture to prevent and treat disease in animals. In humans, over time, some disease-causing microbes have become resistant to antibiotic treatments with significant public health implications. Tuberculosis, gonorrhea, malaria, and childhood ear infections are examples of diseases that are becoming more difficult to treat with antibiotic drugs.

I have long been concerned with the potential problem of antibiotic resistance stemming from the use of antibiotics in animal agriculture. In 1999, and again in 2005, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) published two studies on the matter at my request. The studies found that widespread use of antibiotics in agriculture has been correlated with increased resistance of bacteria to medication, and that antibiotic resistant foodborne pathogens can be transferred from animals to humans. But the studies also found that the extent of human health risk from the use of antibiotics in agriculture is unknown. Further research is needed. That is why in the 2008 farm bill, I included provisions to allow further research to study antibiotic resistant bacteria.
Federal agencies are actively monitoring the correlation between antibiotic use in animal agriculture and any increases in antibiotic resistant pathogens in humans. In fact, last year the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) placed a ban on the use of an antibiotic in poultry feed. FDA evaluates every drug on a case-by-case basis, and the agency has determined that enrofloxacin use in poultry increases resistance in a particular foodborne pathogen.
The animal agriculture sector relies on antibiotics to produce a safe and abundant food supply. It is important that antibiotics be used judiciously for both the health of animals and humans. I will continue to work to ensure that current systems used to evaluate antibiotics in food production are adequate, and I will take your views into consideration when I make decisions on pending legislation regarding the use of antibiotics in agriculture.


Sincerely,
Tom Harkin

United States Senator