FDA finally admits antibiotics in farm animals must stop, but is it too late?

Image: thegreengirls92.wordpress.com

April McCarthy | Prevent Disease

Antibiotics are added to animal feed or drinking water of cattle, hogs, poultry and other food-producing animals to make them gain weight faster or use less food to gain weight. The United Nations and World Health Organization have both stated that humans are building up dangerous levels of resistance to modern antibiotics that could leave them vulnerable to killer diseases in the future. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is implementing, albeit a modest voluntary plan, but still one in the right direction, to phase out the use of certain antibiotics for enhanced food production.

Due to the vast uses implemented for antimicrobial drugs in both humans and animals, they have contributed to the development of antimicrobial resistance. It is imperative that we begin to eliminate the use of drugs from the food supply.

Governments around the world consider antimicrobial-resistant bacteria a major threat to public health. Illnesses caused by drug-resistant strains of bacteria are more likely to be potentially fatal when the medicines used to treat them are rendered less effective.

The UN and WHO wants farmers to stop using antibiotics simply to make their animals grow.

Use of antibiotics leads to resistant strains of bacteria in animals and in the environment. (Thus, if you get sick from Salmonella, for example, the strain may be resistant to many antibiotics.) Meat from corn-fed cattle is also far more contaminated with E coli bacteria, partly because corn interferes with ruminant digestion, and partly because the animals are crowded together in filthy conditions. E. coli levels are much lower in grass-fed cattle.

Antibiotic resistant bacteria are increasing in prevalence and cause many healthcare-associated infections and are estimated to cost approximately $4 billion annually.

FDA is working to address the use of antibiotics in food-producing animals for production uses, such as to enhance growth or improve feed efficiency. These drugs are deemed important because they are also used to treat human disease and might not work if the bacteria they target become resistant to the drugs’ effects.

“We need to be selective about the drugs we use in animals and when we use them,” says William Flynn, DVM, MS, deputy director for science policy at FDA’s Center for Veterinary Medicine (CVM). “Antimicrobial resistance may not be completely preventable, but we need to do what we can to slow it down.”

FDA is issuing a final guidance document that explains how companies can work with the agency to voluntarily remove growth enhancement and feed efficiency indications from the approved uses.

Once manufacturers voluntarily make these changes, the affected products can then only be used in food-producing animals to treat, prevent or control disease under the order of or by prescription from a licensed veterinarian.

“This action promotes the judicious use of important antimicrobials, which protects public health and, at the same time, ensures that sick and at-risk animals receive the therapy they need,” says CVM Director Bernadette Dunham, DVM, Ph.D. “We realize that these steps represent changes for veterinarians and animal producers, and we have been working to make this transition as seamless as possible.”

Drugs Primarily in Feed

Flynn explains that all the drugs affected by this plan are antibacterial products. They have long been FDA-approved for production (e.g. growth enhancement) purposes as well as for the treatment, control or prevention of animal diseases. Even today, he says, it is not entirely understood how these drugs make animals grow faster. The drugs are primarily added to feed, although they are sometimes added to the animals’ drinking water.

Bacteria evolve to survive threats to their existence. In both humans and animals, even appropriate therapeutic uses of antibiotics can promote the development of drug resistant bacteria. When such bacteria enter the food supply, they can be transferred to the people who eat food from the treated animal.

In 2010, FDA called for a strategy to phase out production use of medically important antimicrobial products and to bring the remaining therapeutic uses under the oversight of a veterinarian. The guidance document that FDA is issuing on Dec. 11, 2013, which was previously issued in draft form in 2012, lays out such a strategy and marks the beginning of the formal implementation period.

Why Voluntary?

Flynn explains that the final guidance document made participation voluntary because it is the fastest, most efficient way to make these changes. FDA has been working with associations that include those representing drug companies, the feed industry, producers of beef, pork and turkey, as well as veterinarians and consumer groups.

“Based on our outreach, we have every reason to believe that animal pharmaceutical companies will support us in this effort,” says Michael R. Taylor, FDA’s deputy commissioner for foods and veterinary medicine.

Sources:
preventdisease.com
fda.gov

April McCarthy is a community journalist playing an active role reporting and analyzing world events to advance our health and eco-friendly initiatives.

Why Organic Food Is Better For You Than Conventional

Martina Schlaucher | holistichealthandme.com

Many consumers have started to become curious of the differences between Organic Food and Conventional Food products, and for good reason.  There seems to be a lot of talk going on these days about which are better and WHY… So, let’s explore, shall we?…



When comparing the food labels of similar products where one is labeled “organic” and the other is conventional, there doesn’t seem to be much of a difference.  This of course, raises the question of what allows companies to sell organic products as “better” and also sell them at a higher price.

Image: annewatson photography

First, it should be explained, what “organic” really stands for and what it means to the consumer…

The USDA National Organic Program Consumer Brochure reads:

“Organic food is produced by farmers who emphasize the use of renewable resources and the conservation of soil and water to enhance environmental quality for future generations.
Organic meat, poultry, eggs, and dairy products come from animals that are given no antibiotics or growth hormones. 

Organic food is produced without using most conventional pesticides; fertilizers made with synthetic ingredients or sewage sludge; bioengineering; or ionizing radiation.
Before a product can be labeled ‘organic,’ a Government-approved certifier inspects the farm where the food is grown to make sure the farmer is following all the rules necessary to meet USDA organic standards. 

Companies that handle or process organic food before it gets to your local supermarket or restaurant must be certified, too.”

Even though the ingredient list of conventional products may appear to be the similar to organic products, the biggest difference shows in the way the ingredients are grown, harvested and processed.

In a 2002 Data Collection of Pesticide Residues in Conventional and Organic Food, the following statistics were concluded:

• Conventionally grown samples had multiple residues in 46%, 12% and 62% of USDA, DPR and CU samples, respectively.
• Organic samples had multiple residues in only 7%, 1.3% and 6% percent of the samples in those three data sets.

According to this research alone, there seems to be quite a difference in pesticide residue between conventional and organic products! This can be enough reason to favor organic over conventional, right?
What educated consumers can do, is to study the list of the “dirty dozen” and buy conventional foods with the least amount of pesticide residue.  When deciding to buy Organic and locally grown products, consumers will automatically help promote sustainability and local farming.  Urban Farming is powerful and productive choice this day and age!  What is your family eating, Organic or Conventional Food?

Source: holistichealthandme.com

The FDA is now claiming that walnuts are a drug

by MICHAEL TENNANT | The New American

Image: sustainablehalo.wordpress.com

Seen any walnuts in your medicine cabinet lately? According to the Food and Drug Administration, that is precisely where you should find them. Because Diamond Foods made truthful claims about the health benefits of consuming walnuts that the FDA didn’t approve, it sent the company a letter declaring, “Your walnut products are drugs” — and “new drugs” at that — and, therefore, “they may not legally be marketed … in the United States without an approved new drug application.” The agency even threatened Diamond with “seizure” if it failed to comply.

Diamond’s transgression was to make “financial investments to educate the public and supply them with walnuts,” as William Faloon of Life Extension magazine put it. On its website and packaging, the company stated that the omega-3 fatty acids found in walnuts have been shown to have certain health benefits, including reduced risk of heart disease and some types of cancer. These claims, Faloon notes, are well supported by scientific research: “Life Extension has published 57 articles that describe the health benefits of walnuts”; and “The US National Library of Medicine database contains no fewer than 35 peer-reviewed published papers supporting a claim that ingesting walnuts improves vascular health and may reduce heart attack risk.”

This evidence was apparently not good enough for the FDA, which told Diamond that its walnuts were “misbranded” because the “product bears health claims that are not authorized by the FDA.”

The FDA’s letter continues: “We have determined that your walnut products are promoted for conditions that cause them to be drugs because these products are intended for use in the prevention, mitigation, and treatment of disease.” Furthermore, the products are also “misbranded” because they “are offered for conditions that are not amenable to self-diagnosis and treatment by individuals who are not medical practitioners; therefore, adequate directions for use cannot be written so that a layperson can use these drugs safely for their intended purposes.” Who knew you had to have directions to eat walnuts?

“The FDA’s language,” Faloon writes, “resembles that of an out-of-control police state where tyranny [reigns] over rationality.” He adds:

This kind of bureaucratic tyranny sends a strong signal to the food industry not to innovate in a way that informs the public about foods that protect against disease. While consumers increasingly reach for healthier dietary choices, the federal government wants to deny food companies the ability to convey findings from scientific studies about their products.

Walnuts aren’t the only food whose health benefits the FDA has tried to suppress. Producers of pomegranate juice and green tea, among others, have felt the bureaucrats’ wrath whenever they have suggested that their products are good for people.

Meanwhile, Faloon points out, foods that have little to no redeeming value are advertised endlessly, often with dubious health claims attached. For example, Frito-Lay is permitted to make all kinds of claims about its fat-laden, fried products, including that Lay’s potato chips are “heart healthy.” Faloon concludes that “the FDA obviously does not want the public to discover that they can reduce their risk of age-related disease by consuming healthy foods. They prefer consumers only learn about mass-marketed garbage foods that shorten life span by increasing degenerative disease risk.”

Faloon thinks he knows why this is the case. First, by stifling competition from makers of more healthful alternatives, junk food manufacturers, who he says “heavily lobb[y]” the federal government for favorable treatment, will rake in ever greater profits. Second, by making it less likely that Americans will consume healthful foods, big pharmaceutical companies and medical device manufacturers stand to gain by selling more “expensive cardiac drugs, stents, and coronary bypass procedures” to those made ill by their diets.

But people are starting to fight back against the FDA’s tactics. “The makers of pomegranate juice, for example, have sued the FTC for censoring their First Amendment right to communicate scientific information to the public,” Faloon reports. Congress is also getting into the act with a bill, the Free Speech About Science Act (H.R. 1364), that, Faloon writes, “protects basic free speech rights, ends censorship of science, and enables the natural health products community to share peer-reviewed scientific findings with the public.”

Of course, if the Constitution were being followed as intended, none of this would be necessary. The FDA would not exist; but if it did, as a creation of Congress it would have no power to censor any speech whatsoever. If companies are making false claims about their products, the market will quickly punish them for it, and genuine fraud can be handled through the courts. In the absence of a government agency supposedly guaranteeing the safety of their food and drugs and the truthfulness of producers’ claims, consumers would become more discerning, as indeed they already are becoming despite the FDA’s attempts to prevent the dissemination of scientific research. Besides, as Faloon observed, “If anyone still thinks that federal agencies like the FDA protect the public, this proclamation that healthy foods are illegal drugs exposes the government’s sordid charade.”

Source: The New American 

Read more at realfarmacy.com