20 well-known fast food industries have been using antibiotics, should China's breeding industry be banned

Introduction: antibiotics are becoming more and more popular Recently, the Daily Mail reported that a report jointly released by several agencies disclosed the use of antibiotics in more than 20 well-known fast food chains, including Burger King, Starbucks, Damien's pizza and DQ ice queen, which were ranked at the lowest "F" level and criticized by the name Recently, a report that "350000 people in the United States forced KFC to stop using antibiotics" spread widely In fact, the real question is whether the aquaculture industry should "stop using antibiotics"? Does the use of antibiotics in the breeding industry really harm the health of consumers or promote the production of antibiotic resistant bacteria in the human body? This paper interviewed yuan Zonghui, director of the national veterinary drug safety evaluation laboratory, Professor of Huazhong Agricultural University, and Zhang Hongfu, researcher of Beijing Institute of animal husbandry and veterinary medicine, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences and executive deputy director of the State Key Laboratory of animal nutrition It is well known that antibiotics are beneficial to public health for animals Human beings can use antibiotics to treat bacterial infection Animals in the breeding industry, such as pigs, chickens and cattle, will also be infected by bacteria When they get sick, they also need to be treated with antibiotics This is not only the demand of the breeding industry itself, but also the consideration of "animal welfare" There is not much controversy around the world about this use and there is no "total ban on antibiotics" What some environmental organizations and consumers in the United States are calling for to stop use is actually another use of antibiotics - to promote the growth of animals The use of antibiotic meat in American fast food industry has been normalized in the 1940s Some breeders added penicillin fermentation residue to feed pigs, and found that animals fed this feed grew faster than those fed ordinary feed In 1946, it was reported for the first time that adding antibiotics to the feed could significantly promote the weight gain of broilers Although there are many explanations for why low-dose antibiotics can promote animal growth - such as reducing harmful bacteria in animals, making them healthier, or reducing bacterial metabolites that slow animal growth, thus reducing the nutrition needed for unnecessary immunity However, it has long been agreed that adding antibiotics to feed can prevent diseases, promote animal growth, improve feed utilization, ultimately reduce the cost of breeding, and improve the quality of livestock and poultry meat According to public information, about two-thirds of antibiotics in the United States are used in aquaculture Although China lacks comprehensive statistical data, it is estimated that more than half of antibiotics are used in aquaculture Yuan Zonghui, director of the national veterinary drug safety evaluation laboratory and professor of Huazhong Agricultural University, said that it is easy to understand that more antibiotics are used in the breeding industry, because there are many more animals than people, and the living environment of animals is worse than people, and people can give drugs according to individuals, while livestock in the breeding industry are given drugs according to groups Yuan Zonghui said that in fact, many animals grow with bacteria A certain amount of antibiotics are added to the feed to feed them When these bacteria are controlled, they will not cause diseases What they control is not only animal diseases, but also human and animal diseases Studies have suggested that more than 60% of human diseases are caused by animals Only by controlling zoonoses from the source can we control the spread of these pathogens directly or through animal food For example, in the past, there was a kind of severe infectious disease called "psittaci fever", which was caused by Chlamydia infection The mortality rate of animals and people after infection was very high It was once one of the most important diseases affecting human public health, but after animals widely used antibiotics such as chlortetracycline, the disease disappeared Zhang Hongfu, a researcher of Beijing animal husbandry and Veterinary Research Institute of Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences and executive deputy director of State Key Laboratory of animal nutrition, also believes that the low-dose antibiotics added to feed can promote the growth of animals by 5% - 10% Moreover, in China, because of the more complex environment and poor facilities, animals are more likely to get sick The management level of animal husbandry practitioners is limited If antibiotics are not used, the incidence rate of animal will be higher than that of Europe and America, and the cost of farming will be higher The EU banned antibiotics more for political reasons in the 1970s, and several European countries began to stop the use of growth promoting antibiotics due to the belief that the use of antibiotics may increase bacterial resistance In 1986, Sweden in northern Europe took the lead in banning antibiotics In 1995, Denmark began to ban avoparcin The Danish pig production committee and feed enterprises began to commit to voluntarily reducing the use of antibiotic growth promoting agents The EU banned growth promoting antibiotics, which has a lot to do with Greenpeace Yuan Zonghui said that the EU banned all growth promoting antibiotics, which is related to Sweden and other three Nordic countries joining the EU In 1985, Sweden began negotiations with the European Union, and banned the use of growth promoting antibiotics in the European Union as one of the conditions for accession In order to reach out to these countries, the EU has compromised on this issue The EU banned avomycin in 1997, four other antibiotics in 1999 and all growth promoting antibiotics in feed since 2006 "In fact, the EU's ban on growth promoting antibiotics has a lot to do with Greenpeace Greenpeace does not want to have aquaculture in the EU, because there are certain environmental pollution problems in the aquaculture industry However, the national economy of France, Germany, Britain and many other countries relies on aquaculture to a large extent Greenpeace organizations are not good enough to put forward the requirement of closing the aquaculture industry directly They can only start with new technologies, so they claim that antibiotics have an impact on the environment In addition to antibiotics, they are also opposed to the use of hormones, transgenic and other new technologies that can promote the development of the breeding industry " Yuan told reporters Professor Yuan Zonghui visited Europe every year in recent years and witnessed the current situation and consequences of the EU's "no resistance" He believes that the experience of antibiotics in the EU is very similar to that of genetically modified drugs They are all encouraged by organizations like Greenpeace They use most people's ignorance to form public opinions and finally influence politicians' decisions However, such decisions are not based on scientific evidence Yuan Zonghui pointed out that the EU's policy is to prohibit the addition of small doses (5-40 ppm) of antibiotics in feed as growth promoting agents for livestock and poultry, but antibiotics above 40 ppm can still be used to prevent, control and treat diseases The most direct consequence of EU's "no resistance" policy is the increase of breeding cost According to statistics, the feed conversion rate of pigs from 23kg to 113kg decreased by 1.5%, the survival rate of piglets decreased by 1.5%, and the actual drug cost of each pig increased by 0.25 US dollars in 2006 Overall, the cost per pig increased by $1.25 Due to the increase of breeding cost, the breeding industry in northern Europe is gradually shrinking, and the shortage of animal food can only be imported Yuan Zonghui said that after 2000, although the consumption of general and important antibiotics used in pig industry in the EU decreased year by year, the consumption of some highly important or extremely important antibiotics increased year by year, such as tetracycline and ampicillin In the past, diseases such as pigs and chickens with small doses of antibiotics were necrotizing enteritis Because of the fact that small doses of antibiotics were banned, the incidence rate of chickens and pigs was very high Once the disease occurs, it needs to be treated with large doses of antibiotics What's more, if the intestines of pigs or chickens infected with necrotizing enteritis are accidentally broken in the process of slaughter and processing, the pathogenic bacteria of necrotizing enteritis will pollute animal food, and people may also be infected and sick after contact These are all new problems brought about by "Prohibition of resistance" After the EU's "anti drug ban", the cost of breeding has increased, but the amount of important antibiotics has increased Farmers need antibiotics If the regular channels can't buy antibiotics, it will promote "smuggling of antibiotics" In 2013, Dutch Online reported a smuggling case: six Dutch men were accused by a local court of illegally buying antibiotics from China, suspected of selling them to chicken farmers in northern Holland In addition, because the enterprise does not produce feed for adding medicine, farmers will give medicine by drinking water However, some antibiotics are insoluble in water, and the risk of drug-resistant bacteria induced by the way of drinking water is higher, because the leakage of drinking water pipe will occur, or livestock will throw the water containing antibiotics to the ground in the process of drinking water In a word, the strict policy of "forbidding resistance" has brought great inconvenience to feed processing enterprises and breeding industry There is no evidence that antibiotics in the breeding industry led to the "superbugs" in the EU The logic of banning antibiotics in the EU was that if antibiotics were used in the breeding industry, superbugs would cause superbugs, and if superbugs were transferred to people, it would cause treatment failure, and no drugs were available However, it has been 10 years since "anti drug prohibition" The monitoring results show that the situation of drug-resistant bacteria in European Union is not better than that in the United States On the contrary, several countries in northern Europe, such as Sweden and Finland, which are the first and most firmly banned antibiotics, have higher proportion of drug-resistant factors detected in their chicken and beef than other countries in Europe (drug-resistant factors are one of the indicators reflecting bacterial drug resistance, but there are drug-resistant factors This phenomenon is difficult to explain The use of antibiotics in animals will not lead to the increase of drug-resistant bacteria in humans, yuan Zonghui told reporters Although the public are worried that the widespread use of antibiotics will lead to "super bacteria", so far, including China, Europe, the United States and South America, there is no example that the use of antibiotics in animals will eventually lead to the failure or death of human treatment "Several superbugs reported in the media have resulted in treatment failure, all of which are drug-resistant bacteria caused by hospital medication." For this reason, on January 30, 2015, ECDC (European Center for Disease Control and prevention), EFSA (European Food Safety Agency) and EMA (European Drug Administration) published a joint report on veterinary and human antibiotics for the first time, with more than 100 pages, including three main conclusions: First, the drug-resistant bacteria of animals are quoted by animals using antibiotics, and the drug-resistant bacteria of human are caused by human medical use; second, the third generation cephalosporins and fluoroquinolones are antibiotics, which have nothing to do with the drug-resistant bacteria of human beings, that is to say, their use in animals will not lead to the increase of drug-resistant bacteria of human beings; third, many old antibiotics used in animals It seems that biotin has something to do with the increase of drug-resistant bacteria, but it can't be simply interpreted, because its occurrence is very complex, any link will lead to the production of drug-resistant bacteria This report can be seen as a reflection of the EU's policy of banning antibiotics in the past Low dose antibiotic residues in food will not harm health, and some people are worried about the food safety problems caused by antibiotic residues in animal products However, governments of all countries, including China, have formulated the limits of antibiotic residues in animal food In China, 98% of comparable projects have reached or exceeded international standards From a scientific point of view, as long as it is a qualified animal product, its antibiotic residues are generally harmless Of course, in reality, it is also related to government supervision