Public Health Significance of Feeding Low Levels of Antibiotics to Animals

Abstract

Publisher Summary This chapter focuses on the feeding of low levels of antibiotics to farm animals, which was introduced experimentally in 1949 and commercially in 1950. Chlortetracycline, oxytetracycline, penicillin, and streptomycin were the first to be used, and other antibiotics, especially bacitracin and tylosin, soon came into use. The initial use of low-level antibiotic feeding was to promote growth of chickens, pigs, and calves. The use of antibiotic feeds has increased the production of food for human beings. No deleterious effects on public health in the United States that are attributable by experimental evidence to the use of antibiotics in animal feeds have been reported in more than 20 years of such use. The chapter concludes that the use of antibiotic feeds for farm animals is of benefit to the consumer. There is no evidence that, as practiced in Canada and the United States, it leads to the accumulation of significant residues in meat. Nor is there evidence for the spread of transferable resistance from farms into microorganisms that may cause public health problems.