How well do livestock antibiotic restrictions work? Not too well, according to new research

The use of antibiotics and other antimicrobials to reduce infection and increase production in beef cattle, poultry, and other livestock has long been a driving factor in the dangerous growth of antimicrobial resistance (AMR) in humans.

In the absence of strong federal oversight on this rising threat to public health, several states and cities have implemented policies to restrict antimicrobial use and to increase industry transparency. But how well do these strategies work?

In California, Maryland, and the city and county of San Francisco, the answer is: not too well, according to Jay Graham, associate professor at UC Berkeley School of Public Health, who oversaw the first qualitative study of state and city restrictions, published in PLOS One last month.

“Unfortunately, these policies do not have the enforcement teeth that they need in order to see any real change,” said Graham in an interview. “Antibiotics are a shared resource. We all benefit from them, and by allowing industry to use them in a way to make more economic gains is not helping the public.”

The study was based on surveys and scripted interviews with 19 key informants in California, Maryland, and San Francisco; including individuals working as veterinarians, grocers, animal food producers, researchers, and policy developers.

Results of the interviews found that the effectiveness of state and county policies to reduce antimicrobial use in livestock has been hampered by several obstacles, among them: the refusal of food animal producers to reveal their use of antimicrobials as required; the lack of money for data analysis and enforcement; and vague language that permits loopholes for producers to exploit.

The California and Maryland state laws share the goal of limiting antimicrobial use to sick animals, and for only as long as medically needed, instead of using them routinely on healthy animals to increase production or avoid future illness. The Maryland law has more defined reporting requirements than the California law, requiring veterinarians to report antimicrobial prescriptions. The San Francisco ordinance—under consideration by several other U.S. cities—requires grocers to report the presence of antimicrobials in meat and poultry for sale.

Berkeley Public Health researchers, led by graduate students Scarlet S. Bliss and Maya Homsy-King, found none of the programs were working as planned.

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