Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
antibiotics anyway. They won't make the cold go away. They
won't make you feel better, save for any placebo effects.
Antibiotics can only target bacteria, not viruses. So why do
some doctors prescribe them? Probably because patients
expect
something
, and will be unsatisfied if given nothing.
This is a common occurrence, and while doctors are sim-
ply satisfying their patients' wishes, they are also harming
their health. This is because overprescribing antibiotics makes
it more likely that harmful bacteria will develop resistance,
making bacterial infections difficult to treat when they really
do occur. In some countries one can even buy antibiotics with-
out a prescription, making overuse of antibiotics even more
widespread.
Antibiotics are also given to cattle, pigs, and chickens (not
the ones laying eggs, though). Sometimes the animal is sick
and receives a high dose. However, even if the animal is not
sick it might receive low doses on a regular basis. These low
doses are not enough to suppress an actual infection; never-
theless, they keep the animals healthier and growing faster.
This practice may be good for pigs, but it poses health dangers
to humans. Regularly giving livestock low doses of antibiotics
is like presenting harmful bacteria with a weakened enemy.
The bacteria “practice” fighting the weakened antibiotic, thus
learning how to withstand a stronger dosage and eventually
becoming immune. That resistant bacteria may later infect
humans and thrive, regardless of the antibiotics the doc-
tors prescribe. Or, even if the resistant bacteria do not infect
humans they may share their resistance properties with bacte-
ria that do (and yes, organisms can swap genes).
So antibiotics are overused in both humans and livestock.
Doctors prescribe them at high doses when people are sick
with viral infections, and livestock receive low doses regard-
less of whether they are sick. Both practices threaten human
health, but it is unclear how serious the threat is, or which
threat is greater. Doctors experience less criticism because they
overprescribe antibiotics out of good intentions of improving
