Gov. Hogan: Sign the Keep Antibiotics Effective Act
The inappropriate use of human antibiotics on factory farms is seen as one of the culprits in the two million illnesses and 23,000 deaths caused by drug-resistant bacteria each year in the United States, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Please ask Governor Larry Hogan to sign the "Keep Antibiotics Effective Act" into law. This bill limits the use of human antibiotics in farm animals that are not sick.
Recently, the Maryland House and Senate passed Senate Bill 422, sponsored by Sen. Paul Pinsky, and House Bill 602, sponsored by Del. Shane Robinson, to allow the use of antibiotics to treat sick animals and control disease outbreaks, but ban the routine, non-therapeutic use of medically important antibiotics in food-producing animals. This practice will help preserve the effectiveness of antibiotic drugs in humans by eliminating their overuse on farms.
The American Academy of Pediatrics states: “Because of the link between antibiotic use in food-producing animals and the occurrence of antibiotic-resistant infections in humans, antibiotic agents should be used in food-producing animals only to treat and control infectious diseases and not to promote growth or to prevent disease routinely.”
Please urge the governor to act now by clicking the link at right (your address will auto-generate the body of a pre-written letter).
Thank you in advance for your action!
