Source:  LIsa M. Keefe, MEATINGPLACE, 5/26/11

Five activist groups have together filed suit against the Food and Drug Administration, the Department of Health and Human Services, the Center for Veterinary Medicine, and the directors of each, over the administration of antibiotics to livestock for reasons other than to treat disease or infection, according to court papers.

The addition of low levels of antibiotics to feed of healthy livestock — so-called subtherapeutic use — has been a common practice for more than 50 years. In the lawsuit, the Natural Resources Defense Council Inc., Center for Science in the Public Interest, Food Animal Concerns Trust, Public Citizen Inc. and Union of Concerned Scientists Inc. reference research that indicates the use of antibiotics in livestock may promote bacterial resistance to a number of drugs commonly used to treat ill humans, including penicillins, cephalosporins and aminoglycosides.

The lawsuit cites one of the FDA’s own documents as saying antimicrobial resistance, “and the resulting failure of antimicrobial therapies in humans, is a mounting public health problem of global significance.”
It also states that the FDA “reported last year that livestock grown in the U.S. consumed about 28.6 million pounds of antibiotics and the agency confirmed recently that about 74 [percent] of those antibiotics were administered through feed.”

The groups behind the lawsuit point out that the FDA is required by law to withdraw approval for an animal drug if the agency “finds that the drugs is not shown to be safe for the uses for which it was approved,” and say the subtherapeutic administration of antibiotics qualifies. They also note that CSPI and other groups had twice before petitioned the agency to withdraw its approval for low-level dosing of livestock, petitions that were ignored.
 

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