The following is from a Los Angeles Times editorial:
Beware of magical discoveries: They generally require careful use lest the magic wear off. Even the genie's lamp gave only three wishes.
Antibiotics, at one point viewed as miracle drugs, are among the discoveries that have been used too carelessly, giving rise to an era of resistant infections.
The report on resistant infections released last week by the national Centers for Disease Control and Prevention solidified understanding of the toll taken by these infections. It should serve as a wake-up for the medical profession and Congress to move more swiftly to preserve the usefulness of antibiotics.
The livestock industry alone consumes 80 percent of the antibiotics in this country — to promote growth and prevent infections from sweeping through crowded pens. The agriculture lobby has been fierce in its fight to keep using as much of these drugs as it wants. But society is picking up the large and growing tab in the form of resistant bacteria. The tally according to the CDC: 2 million Americans sickened each year, 23,000 deaths, $23 billion a year in added medical costs and $35 billion in lost productivity.
The Food and Drug Administration is offering only guidelines for the agriculture industry, and experience has shown that the industry does not respond to voluntary restrictions. Congress must act while most antibiotics still retain their power to cure. Medical associations should draw up new protocols for antibiotic use.
The National Institutes of Health should be looking beyond the antibiotic era to fund research and development of non-antibiotic treatments. The key to keeping antibiotics useful for a long time is, contradictorily, to avoid using them as much as possible.
