[Congressional Record Volume 157, Number 35 (Wednesday, March 9, 2011)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E437-E438]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




       THE PRESERVATION OF ANTIBIOTICS FOR MEDICAL TREATMENT ACT

                                 ______
                                 

                     HON. LOUISE McINTOSH SLAUGHTER

                              of new york

                    in the house of representatives

                        Wednesday, March 9, 2011

  Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of The Preservation of 
Antibiotics for Medical Treatment Act.
  Every year, two million Americans acquire bacterial infections during 
their hospital stay, and 90,000 will die from them. 70 percent of these 
infections will be resistant to the drugs commonly used to treat them.
  Drug resistance prolongs the length, cost, and severity of the 
illness, raising health care costs and reducing health outcomes. In the 
1990s, the Institute of Medicine estimated that health care costs were 
upwards of $5 billion; more recent cost estimates have climbed even 
higher. According to a recent peer-reviewed article published in the 
Clinical Infectious Diseases journal, antibiotic resistant infections 
extended hospital stays between six and 13 days as well as increasing 
mortality. The researchers concluded that antibiotic resistance costs 
society over $35 billion nationally.
  Antibiotic resistance is a major public health crisis, and yet 
antibiotics are used regularly and with little oversight in 
agriculture.
  Many of the antibiotics used in agriculture as animal feed additives 
are also used to treat humans, including tetracyclines, sulfonamides, 
penicillins, macrolides, aminoglycosides, chloramphenicols, and 
streptogramins. These classes of antibiotics are critical to our 
treatment of potentially fatal human diseases. Tetracyclines, for 
example, are used to treat people potentially exposed to anthrax. 
Macrolides and sulfonamides are used to prevent secondary infections in 
patients with AIDS and to treat pneumonia in HIV-infected patients. 
Penicillins are used to treat infections ranging from strep throat to 
meningitis.
  Despite their importance to human medicine, antibiotics are used 
routinely to promote growth in livestock agriculture. According to 
analyses by the Food and Drug Administration, 13.1 million kilograms of 
antibacterial drugs were sold for use in livestock and poultry, and 3.3 
million kilograms were sold for use in humans in 2009. It is 
unacceptable that 80 percent of antibacterial drugs were sold for use 
in agriculture in the United States in 2009--rather than for human 
health purposes.
  The overuse of antibiotics in agriculture has been conclusively shown 
to harm human health.
  A 2002 publication in the Clinical Infectious Diseases journal 
analyzing more than 500 scientific articles concluded that ``many lines 
of evidence link antimicrobial resistant human infections to food-borne 
pathogens of animal origin.''
  The Institute of Medicine, likewise, concluded that reducing the 
agricultural usage of antibiotics was necessary. Their 2003 report on 
Microbial Threats to Health concluded, ``Clearly, a decrease in the 
inappropriate use of antimicrobials in human medicine alone is not 
enough. Substantial efforts must be made to decrease inappropriate 
overuse in animals and agriculture as well.''
  Federal agencies, public health organizations, and scientists are 
united by their concern with the overuse of antibiotics, and its 
implications for human health.
  Despite increased attention to the issue, the response has been 
inadequate. Part of the problem has been the Food and Drug 
Administration's, FDA's, failure to properly address the effect of the 
misuse of animal antibiotics on the efficacy of human drugs.
  Although the FDA could withdraw its approval for these antibiotics, 
its record of reviewing currently approved drugs under existing 
procedures indicate that it would take nearly a century to remove these 
medically important antibiotics from the feed given to food producing 
animals. In October 2000, for example, the FDA began consideration of a 
proposal to withdraw its approval for the therapeutic use of 
fluoroquinolones in poultry. The review, and eventual withdraw of 
approval, took five years to complete. Under its current regulations, 
the FDA must review each class of antibiotics separately.
  For this reason, I introduced the Preservation of Antibiotics for the 
Medical Treatment Act, PAMTA.
  This legislation would phase out the use of the seven classes of 
medically significant antibiotics that are currently approved for non-
therapeutic use in animal agriculture. This bill only restricts the 
non-therapeutic use of antibiotics in animals; it does not infringe 
upon the use of these drugs to treat a sick animal.
  Addressing this critical issue is not only important for protecting 
the public's health, but also to ensure that American livestock 
production remain competitive in international markets.
  Nations around the world including those of the European Union, New 
Zealand, Thailand, and Korea all have either banned or will begin 
banning the use of antibiotics for the purpose of growth promotion in 
animal feed. Under World Trade Organization rules, trading partners who 
implement this ban will have the right to refuse imports that do not 
meet this standard. Accordingly, if the United States does not conduct 
similar restrictions, but continues to allow for the non-therapeutic 
use of antibiotics in livestock, there may be major trade and economic 
implications.
  Limiting antibiotic usage in agriculture is eminently practical, as 
Denmark's example shows. After banning the non-therapeutic usage of 
antibiotics, Denmark increased productivity while lowering antibiotic 
usage. A recently published article in the American Journal of 
Veterinary Research evaluated the effectiveness of Denmark's ban on 
non-therapeutic usage of antibiotics, and determined that the ban did 
not harm agricultural productivity. From 1992 to 2008, antimicrobial 
usage per kilogram of pig produced decreased from 100 to 49--a decrease 
of more than 50 percent. At the same time, pig production increased 
from 18.4 to 27.1 million pigs--an increase of 47 percent. This peer-
reviewed evaluation reveals that eliminating non-therapeutic usage of 
antibiotics helped position Denmark's agricultural industrially 
globally.
  The Preservation of Antibiotics for Medical Treatment Act, therefore, 
is an urgent trade matter as well as an urgent public health matter.
  When we go to the grocery store to pick up dinner, we should be able 
to buy our food without the worry that eating it will expose our family 
to potentially deadly bacteria that will no longer respond to our 
medical treatments. Unless we act now, we will unwittingly be 
permitting animals to serve as incubators for resistant bacteria.
  It is time for Congress to stand with scientists, the World Health 
Organization, the American Medical Association, and the National 
Academy of Sciences and do something

[[Page E438]]

to address the spread of resistant bacteria. We cannot afford for our 
medicines to become obsolete.

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