Agricultural/Livestock consumption: As global demand for animal protein grows, antibiotics are increasingly used to raise food-producing animals in intensive production--mostly to promote growth, rather than treat disease. The result is an increasing prevalence of antibiotic-resistant bacteria in livestock, poultry, and aquaculture. Also many farmers are transitioning to intensive agriculture and often use antibiotics to optimize production. More antibiotics are used in poultry, swine, and cattle to promote growth and prevent disease than are used by the entire human population. Globally, livestock consumed at least 63,200 tons of antibiotics in 2010, accounting for nearly 66% of the estimated 100,000 tons of antibiotics produced annually worldwide, which is projected to rise to 105.600 tons by 2030.
In 2010, China was estimated to consume the most antibiotics in livestock, followed by the United States, Brazil, Germany, India, Spain, Russia, Mexico, France and Canada.
Animal antibiotic use provides no health benefits to the animals but accelerates antibiotic resistance. Recent analyses suggest that growth promoters have a smaller effect on animal growth than assumed. The countries with the greatest expected increases in food demand and animal antibiotic use currently have the least efficient farming systems. Emphasis should be on improving productivity without antibiotic growth promoters.
Trends in antibiotic resistance
The most recent worldwide estimates of global antibiotic resistance, published by the WHO in 2014, list Klebsiella pneumoniae, Escherichia coli, and Staphylococcus aureus as the three agents of greatest concern, associated with both hospital- and community-acquired infections.
In 2014 in India, 57% of the infections caused by Klebsiella pneumoniae, a dangerous superbug found in hospitals, were found to be resistant to the last-resort antibiotic class of drugs carbapenems, up from 29% in 2008. It was more than 60% resistant for four out of five drug classes tested. This is a dangerous trend as the Klebsiella bug is around 80% resistant to the drug class 3rd generation cephalosporins, 73% resistant to fluoroquinolones, and 63% to aminoglycosides. For comparison, these drugs, are still effective against Klebsiella infections in 90% of cases in USA and over 95% of cases in Europe.
India also has the highest rates of Escherichia coli (E.coli) resistance with strains of E.coli being more than 80% resistant to three different drug classes, thus increasingly limiting treatment options. E.coli resistance is also high and rising for many drug types in other regions too. In Europe, North America, South and Southeast Asia and parts of Africa, resistance to aminopenicillins--a broad-spectrum antibiotic class--is around 50%.
Incidence of methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), a highly dangerous type of resistant pathogen contracted mostly in hospitals, has declined in Europe, USA, Canada and South Africa during the past eight years. However it is rising in sub-Saharan Africa, India, Latin America, and Australia and was recorded at 47% in India in 2014, and 90% in Latin American hospitals in 2013.
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