After Senator Gillibrand's Yearlong Push for Reform, White House Announces New Regulations to Prevent Dangerous Antibiotic Resistant Pathogens in Food
Press Release
Following her yearlong push for reform, U.S. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand today applauded the new White House regulations that will require veterinarians to oversee the use of medically-important antibiotics in food animals. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) regulations establish a the Veterinary Feed Directive which requires that medically important antibiotics be used under veterinary oversight, halts the over-the-counter sale of antibiotics, and ends the use of these important medications for growth promotion. Senator Gillibrand has pushed for this new directive since January 2014 in letters to the FDA and the Office of Management and Budget, stressing the need for better oversight of antibiotics used in animals raised for human consumption.
The FDA confirmed the misuse and overuse of antibiotics is a key factor in the development of antibiotic-resistant pathogens. The Center for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that drug-resistant bacteria causes two million illnesses and approximately 23,000 deaths each year in the United States alone. The Veterinary Feed Directive will ensure that antibiotics used in animal feeds will be used in appropriate dosages and for a specified time.
"If a foodborne illness is caused by an antibiotic resistant bacteria, it is much harder to treat. We know that the misuse of antibiotics contributes to resistance which is why I pushed for better oversight of the medicines used in animal feeds," Senator Gillibrand a member of the Senate Agriculture Committee. "Thousands of Americans are hospitalized each year because of foodborne illness, and an alarming number of those cases are resistant to the medicines doctors use to treat patients. This new directive gives veterinarians the tools they need to dispense medically important antibiotics more judiciously and efficiently, helping to curb the growth of antibiotic resistant bacteria and make our food safer. By ending the over-the-counter sale of these medicines we can better preserve the effectiveness of antibiotics humans need to stay healthy.
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