Running head: ARE ANTIBIOTICS KIILING US?

Are antibiotics killing us?:

Increase of antibiotic resistance in bacteria due to overuse

Safin Hasan

Northwestern University in Qatar

ARE ANTIBIOTICS KIILING US?

Increase of antibiotic resistance in bacteria due to overuse

The use of Antibiotics in farmed livestock has reached an alarming stage now. As we

started domesticating and farming animals to meet the increasing dietary needs of the growing

population, we have constantly faced a lot of issues like animal hygiene and mass disease spread

among these animals. To prevent this from happening, antibiotics are regularly fed to every

farmed animal from poultry, cattle to fish whether they are sick or not, which leads to overuse.

Although antibiotics serve several useful purposes, the overuse in farms and agriculture result in

gradual loss of its effectiveness, posing great threat to humans’ and global health.

To understand the problem, one needs to know why antibiotics are used in farms and

agriculture in the first place. The main purpose it serves is to keep the production cost down.

With the rising demand for meat, we were forced to find more and more efficient ways to farm

animals. In 1945, a typical henhouse would accommodate around 500 birds however now, the

number ranges from 80,000 to 175,000 birds. It’s not uncommon to finds feedlots housing over

500,000 cows crammed within a few hundred acres (McKenna, 2019). This keeps the cost down

as farmers no longer have to pay attention to individual animals’ health and doesn’t require huge

land for farm, which saves them the labor and land cost but by sacrificing the living conditions

and hygiene of animals. However, what is problematic is that due to the unhealthy living

conditions, this becomes the breeding place for microbes and bacteria. Moreover, since the

animals are so closely packed together with each other, it’s very easy for diseases to spread and

would often infect the entire farm overnight. To prevent this from happening, farmers mix

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antibiotics in their feed which also contributes to the weight gain of these animals, so antibiotics

prove to be economically viable. Scientific claims suggest that there are numerous bacteria

within our body and a significant portion of energy is spent on fighting them on a regular basis

(Schmidt, 2002). When antibiotics are taken, less energy is spent which results in weight gain in

animals. However though, this is not at all how antibiotics are used for us humans. We only take

antibiotics when we get sick to cure it, but animals are constantly fed antibiotics to prevent

diseases, not to cure them. This results in overuse of antibiotics and gradual loss of its

effectiveness (McKenna, 2019).

Understanding how antibiotic resistance form and is transferred to humans require

complex biological understanding. But in simpler words, the microbial world reacts with

defensive mutations to each antibiotic they’re exposed to. When a human gets sick, the doctors

prescribe an antibiotic plan which they’re supposed to complete to gain full resistance against the

bacteria which caused the disease. However, it’s not uncommon for people to stop their

antibiotic plan midway once they feel better. This kills just portions of the bacteria responsible

for making them sick but not all of them. The survivor bacteria then mutate to learn the fighting

techniques for that particular antibiotic and once they’ve mastered that, that bacteria gains

resistance from that antibiotic. One might argue that antibiotics are given to animals constantly

so, there’s no way microbes in animals can become resistant from the antibiotic. But this works a

bit differently for animals. As early in this paper, its already mentioned how antibiotics are used

for preventive purposes in animals and not curing, so the antibiotic dose is very weak. The main

purpose for humans is to kill the disease as fast as possible for which, stronger dose of antibiotic

is given for short amount of time often 1-2 weeks. But for animals, the antibiotic cycle starts

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during their birth and goes on till their death. This small dose doesn’t kill the entire colony of

bacteria apparently, the survivor bacteria learns to gain resistance from the antibiotic and help

the animal gain weight (Schmidt, 2002). Bacteria acquire resistance by either of these three

processes: inheritance, spontaneous mutation while fighting antibiotic and by transfer of resistant

genes to nearby bacteria in a process called ‘horizontal transfer’ or ‘bacterial sex’. You might be

wondering that if the bacteria inside the cattle gain antibiotic resistance, why doesn’t it kill the

animal? The answer to that question is the bacteria is constantly fighting the antibodies, not able

to win over them completely as there’s constant supply of antibodies and also, not being able to

lose as well since the antibiotic supply is low and it doesn’t outnumber the bacteria. This keeps

them fighting the antibody, not being able to attack the animal body. During this time, the

bacteria learn new resistance techniques and by the time the animal is killed and processed for

consumption as food, the bacteria already have the resistance against the antibiotics it was

exposed to before travelling to human body. If an antibiotic loses its effectiveness on animals, it

will not work for humans either because often, the bacteria responsible for making us sick are the

same bacteria responsible to make an animal sick. A decade ago, Doctors had a strong last resort

antibiotic called colistin which was used to treat highly resistant diseases. Due the overuse of this

antibiotic, it has lost his effectiveness over time (Schmidt, 2002). From 2000 to 2018, the

number of antibiotic resistance bacteria have tripled (McKenna, 2019). Some strains of human

pathogens are now resistant to over a hundred antibiotics (Schmidt, 2002). Diseases once thought

to be eradicated like TB (tuberculosis), are making a comeback again due to the antibiotic

resistance. And this all is caused by the overuse of antibiotics for non-therapeutical use in

animals.

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On the bright side, Antibiotics are economically efficient. It is evident that antibiotics are

necessary for the wellbeing of animals. But it is not the use rather, the overuse which is creates

the problem. Not enough organizations and people are aware of the severe consequences of the

overuse of antibiotics. As a result, till date, no other better alternative has been discovered yet

(Schmidt, 2002). Some stakeholders argue that drastic measures are unnecessary as bacteria in

human body get resistant by the antibiotics taken by human. They question the degree to which

extent antibiotic resistant bacteria travel to humans. Bacteria might get resistant within our body

if we misuse antibiotics or do not complete full dose but most of the times, the drug resistant

microbials enter our body through consumption of meat which have been exposed to overuse of

antibiotics (Schmidt, 2002).

Since this hasn’t reached a life-threatening condition yet, people aren’t concerned about it to the

extent they should be. When United Nations General Assembly held an all-day event to address

the problems associated with the overuse of antibiotics, many representatives of different

countries expressed that they are more concerned about feeding their population than being

concerned about Global health (Schmidt, 2002). The resistance to antibiotics is not same all over

the world. The problematic countries are mainly the developing countries whose meat

consumption is increasing at high rate like China, India, Brazil, Turkey, Iran and Kenya

(McKenna, 2019). The farm owners aren’t properly made aware of the consequences and threat

it processes to global health. This leads to overuse of the drug and results in antibiotic resistance

in bacteria. If this keeps going at this rate, we’ll soon find ourselves run out of effective

antibiotics to treat our diseases as, the antibiotics considered wonder drugs 10 years back aren’t

effective at all now.

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References:

McKenna, M. (2019). Farm Animals Are the Next Big Antibiotic Resistance Threat. Wired.

Retrieved from https://www.wired.com/story/farm-animals-are-the-next-big-antibiotic-

resistance-threat/

Schmidt, C. W. (2002). Antibiotic resistance in livestock: More at stake than steak.

Environmental Health Perspectives, 110(7), A396–A402.