January 20, 2014

 

 

Consumers Association of Penang's (CAP) president, SM Mohamed Idris, has urged the Malaysian government and ministries in charge of agricultural and health to ban the use of antibiotics in animal feeds and set up a national system to monitor antibiotic use in food for animals.

 

He said that several studies on meat like chicken, beef, mutton and frozen burgers found an alarmingly high incidence of antibiotic-resistant bacteria in them. Consuming foods contaminated with such bacteria can cause life-threatening complications and treating such cases would be difficult, Idris explained.

 

In livestock production, antibiotics are given to animals for a number of reasons: treatment, prevention of disease and primarily growth promotion. Antibiotics which are used as growth promoters are generally not considered as drugs. They are either unlicensed or licensed solely as feed additives. Most of the antibiotics given to animals are also used for human health purposes.

 

According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), use of antibiotics in animal husbandry is generally not based on sound scientific principles. In Malaysia, there are currently 97 antibiotics registered and most are used in poultry and pig farms, compared cattle and goat farms. More than half of them are not recommended for veterinary use by the WHO.

 

Idris said that the national monitoring system was crucial to document quantities and classes of antibiotics used for risk analysis, interpretation of resistance surveillance data and to assess the impact of interventions to promote prudent use.

 

In order to raise public awareness on antimicrobial resistance, CAP also advocates a national inter-sectoral task force comprising healthcare professionals, veterinarians, academics, agricultural scientists, consumers, and the media to be set up.

 

Idris called on the government to outline adequate guidelines for veterinarians in animal husbandry to curb misuse of antibiotics. He also urged  the government to monitor imported meat products for antibiotic resistant contamination and the stringent enforcement of rules. He revealed that a study by the Department of Veterinary Services (DVS) in 2012 revealed that half of the domestic chickens were resistant to ampicillin, sulphonamide and tetracycline.

 

Salmonella can cause diarrhoea, fever, and abdominal cramps while resistant infections are more severe and have higher hospitalisation rates.

 

"Salmonella is showing resistance to more classes of antibiotics and is a serious public health threat," said Idris. Multi-drug resistance was detected in 35.3% isolates (bacteria samples).

 

According to Idris, local researchers also found the presence of multi-drug resistant strains of Listeria monocytogenes bacteria, in frozen burger patties taken from supermarkets and other retail shops in the country, which can cause listeriosis. Symptoms of listeriosis include gastrointestinal upset, headaches, fever and in severe cases, brain infection and or blood poisoning.

 

Idris clamied that there was increasing evidence linking newly emerging resistant bacteria in animals being transmitted to humans mainly through meat and other food of animal origin. He recalled that four people died and 60 others were hospitalised after eating contaminated food during a wedding feast in Kedah last October.

 

Due to the link between antibiotic use in food-producing animals and the occurrence of antibiotic-resistant infections in humans, Idris believed that antibiotics should be used in food producing animals only under veterinary supervision.

 

According to the US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, antibiotics should only be used to manage and treat infections in animals.