Great news! The Maryland General Assembly has just passed the Keep Antibiotics Effective Act of 2019 (SB471/HB652), an important step in safeguarding against growing antibiotic resistance. We hope that Governor Hogan will sign this critical bill into law. Now we’re counting on you to urge him to sign this bill!

Across the country, each year, antibiotic-resistant infections sicken over 2 million people, kill up to 162 thousand people, and result in over $55 billion in health care costs.  Overuse of antibiotics contributes to this resistance. Yet approximately two-thirds of human antibiotics sold in the US are sold for livestock, not people. The World Health Organization has identified ending the routine use of antibiotics in agriculture as a crucial step in fighting antibiotic resistance.

Because of that, in 2017, the Maryland General Assembly passed a bill to stop the routine use of antibiotics in livestock. But Maryland regulations written under that law were so weak that they would fail to achieve the 2017 law’s goal of preventing routine, low-dose use of antibiotics on large farms.

The Keep Antibiotics Effect Act of 2019 closes these loopholes. It ensures that antibiotics will only be used to treat sick animals and control disease outbreaks – not for routine preventative use which contributes to antibiotic resistance. It also requires monitoring and reporting to ensure that the law’s goals are being met.  It is an important step towards fighting antibiotic resistance.