Put Our Health Before Industry Profits!

The Senate is set to renew a Food and Drug Administration (FDA) program that funds the review of new animal drug applications. Keep Antibiotics Working (KAW) is calling on the Senate to attach to this bill landmark Senate legislation that could finally stem antibiotic overuse in confined animal feeding operations (CAFOs) and preserve these precious drugs for future generations.

Antibiotics are widely used without prescription in the feed and water of animals that are not sick, leading to a crisis of antibiotic-resistant human and animal diseases. Today, the FDA virtually is ignoring this problem.

Write to your Senators today. Tell them to pass a bill that includes provisions to protect human health and keep antibiotics working!

Sample Letter for Campaign

Subject: Put Our Health Before Industry Profits!

Dear [ Decision Maker ] ,

I am writing to urge you to include provisions in the Animal Drug User Fee Act (ADUFA) to protect human health and keep antibiotics working.

Currently, ADUFA provides fees from industry to fund the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to review applications for new animal drugs, but fails to take into account the effects of the continued use of these drugs--especially antibiotics--on human health.

Antibiotic resistance due to overuse is a crisis in human and animal medicine. Tens of thousands of Americans suffer from antibiotic-resistant diseases each year. The widespread use of important human antibiotics in the feed and water of animals that are not sick has been implicated in the emergence of diseases that do not respond to treatment, including food borne illness, systemic blood infections, and MRSA.

ADUFA should not be passed until Congress instructs the FDA to review the effect of antibiotics used in animal feed and water on resistance, collect data on how these drugs are used, and stop unnecessary uses of drugs that are found to cause antibiotic resistance.

Sincerely,

Campaign Launched:
July 28, 2008


Background Information

An estimated 70 percent of all antibiotics used in the United States are regularly added to the feed of livestock and poultry that are not sick. Bacteria that are constantly exposed to antibiotics develop antibiotic resistance. This means that when humans get sick from resistant bacteria, the antibiotics prescribed by doctors don't work.

Antibiotic resistance is becoming increasingly common, and scientists agree that the overuse of antibiotics in CAFOs (confined animal feeding operations) plays a big role. Today, new antibiotic-resistant diseases are being linked to CAFO practices, including methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), a disease responsible for over 18,000 deaths each year in the United States.

Why isn’t the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) putting an end to the use of these drugs in CAFOs for animals that are not even sick? Even if FDA had the will to act, agency resources are tied up elsewhere. Applications by drug companies for new animal drugs are reviewed by the FDA in exchange for fees from industry. This faulty “user fee” arrangement forces the FDA to be financially dependent on the very industry it is tasked with regulating, dictates the agency’s priorities, and forces the agency to adhere to strict deadlines for new drug approvals. As a consequence, other priorities, such as reviewing the effect of already approved antibiotics on human and animal health, are virtually ignored. More...