Source: Tom Johnston, MEATINGPLACE, 10/27/16

Sales of antimicrobials among food-animal producers in the United States have been on the rise, but the chicken industry is showing signs of helping to buck the trend, a Food and Drug Administration official said here at the National Chicken Council’s annual meeting.

Dr. Stephen Ostroff, the FDA’s deputy commissioner for foods and veterinary medicine, said data show that sales of antimicrobials among food-animal producers rose 22 percent from 2009 to 2014, including a 4 percent bump from 2013 to 2014. But that doesn’t account for the probable impact of the agency’s guidelines for industry on limiting the use of antibiotics in food animals or the industry’s efforts in doing so.

Those guidelines were first issued in 2013, with the final ruling on them released in June 2015. The guidelines become effective Jan. 1, 2017. Many companies are already following them.

Ostroff applauded the chicken industry for its efforts, noting that there was a 34 percent increase in sales of antibiotic-free chicken in 2014 to address growing demand for that product. He cited a recent Global Opportunity Network survey that showed that 86 percent of consumers want antibiotic-free products and 60 percent of consumers are willing to pay for these products.

Those efforts appear to be having an impact in reducing antimicrobial resistance. Ostroff shared data from the FDA’s National Antimicrobial Resistance Monitoring System (NARMS) from 2002 to 2015 showing that salmonella isolates from retail chicken resistant to antibiotics have been on a steep decline in the last five years and have fallen to the lowest levels in that time period.
Ostroff said FDA is in the process of collecting additional data on antibiotic sales by species to better determine trends and the impacts of ongoing efforts to reduce antibiotic use, but it looks like things are moving in the right direction.

“It does appear to me that the industry is doing something that’s having an impact on the problem,” he said.

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