The Centers for Disease Control
on Monday confirmed a link between routine use of antibiotics in
livestock and growing bacterial resistance that is killing at least
23,000 people a year.
The report is the first by the government to estimate how many people die annually of infections that no longer respond to antibiotics because of overuse in people and animals.
CDC Director Thomas Frieden called for urgent steps to scale back and monitor use, or risk reverting to an era when common bacterial infections of the urinary tract, bloodstream, respiratory system and skin routinely killed and maimed.
"We will soon be in a post-antibiotic era if we're not careful," Frieden said. "For some patients and some microbes, we are already there."
The discovery of penicillin in 1928 transformed medicine. But because bacteria rapidly evolve to resist the drugs, and resistance is encouraged with each use, antibiotics are a limited resource.
http://www.sfgate.com/health/article/Report-links-antibiotics-at-farms-to-human-deaths-4819492.php
The report is the first by the government to estimate how many people die annually of infections that no longer respond to antibiotics because of overuse in people and animals.
CDC Director Thomas Frieden called for urgent steps to scale back and monitor use, or risk reverting to an era when common bacterial infections of the urinary tract, bloodstream, respiratory system and skin routinely killed and maimed.
"We will soon be in a post-antibiotic era if we're not careful," Frieden said. "For some patients and some microbes, we are already there."
The discovery of penicillin in 1928 transformed medicine. But because bacteria rapidly evolve to resist the drugs, and resistance is encouraged with each use, antibiotics are a limited resource.
http://www.sfgate.com/health/article/Report-links-antibiotics-at-farms-to-human-deaths-4819492.php
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