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Organic group disputes figures on antibiotic use
THE Soil Association is disputing new government figures that appear to show fewer antiobiotics being used by farmers.
The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs said sales of "veterinary therapeutic antimicrobials" in 2007 were well down on 2006.
Defra has been collecting and reporting the figures for several years, in response to concerns about resistance to antibiotics being encouraged in animals and then transferred on to humans.
In the past, the Soil Association, representing the organic farming movement and its customers, has complained about lack of detail in the Defra reports.
This year, it has complimented Defra for responding to its criticisms - and says it has been able to glean enough information to show that the downward trend in overall consumption is more or less explained by falling numbers of animals.
Consumption of two of the most effective antibiotics available was actually up, in terms of average prescriptions per animal, said the association – and Defra did not dispute its interpretation.
Fluoroquinoline consumption on farms was up 48 per cent since 2001 and cephalosporin consumption by 138 per cent because the medicines are out of patent and have become much cheaper than they were. They are both highly important in human medicine.
Richard Young, a Soil Association researcher, said pig and poultry farmers and their vets were quite clearly ignoring the advice which all doctors treating people were expected to follow – to save the strongest treatments until all else had been tried.
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Saturday 26 May 2012
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