Correspondence: Results of new FDA rules on antibiotic use in US food-producing animals

Abstract

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has reported results of its first year of enforced rules to decrease the use of medically important antibiotics in US agriculture. In 2012 in the USA, over 70% percent by weight of antibiotics that are medically important for humans were used in food-producing animals and 30% used to treat humans. Reduction of agricultural antibiotic use is a key One Health intervention against antimicrobial resistance (AMR), which moves fluidly and internationally between pathogens, humans, animals and the environment, causing drug-resistant infections.