Stop Overusing Antibiotics on Healthy Farm Animals

Dear Representative,

Industrial-scale farms feed animals huge amounts of antibiotics -- not to treat disease but to promote growth and to compensate for stressful, crowded conditions. But the use of so many antibiotics in animal agriculture also speeds the development and spread of resistant bacteria, which makes many life-saving medicines less effective.

Resistance to antibiotics is a public health crisis on the rise. These crucial drugs should only be used when necessary but 70 percent of antibiotics used in the United States are given to healthy chickens, pigs and cattle to increase weight gain or to prevent illnesses.

This overuse of antibiotics puts humans in danger because it spreads bacteria that develop resistances to life-saving drugs. That's why we need to pass the Preservation of Antibiotics for Medical Treatment Act, which will make the Food and Drug Administration reevaluate agricultural uses of the seven classes of antibiotics that are important to human health, which include:

- Penicillins (natural penicillins, penase resistant penicillins, 4 antipseudomonal
penicillins, and aminopenicillins)
- Tetracyclines
- Aminoglycosides
- Streptogramins
- Macrolides
- Lincomycin
- Sulfonamides

Please pass the Preservation of Antibiotics for Medical Treatment Act (H.R. 1549) and help end the overuse of medically important antibiotics in feed for farm animals that aren't sick.

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