Antibiotic resistance in humans is a real problem, but causes less clear

The most recent CDC report on the growing problem of antibiotic resistant microbes was published in 2014, entitled Antibiotic Resistance Threats in the U.S., 2013. The study states, “Antimicrobial resistance is one of our most serious health threats. Infections from resistant bacteria are now too common, and some pathogens have even become resistant to multiple types or classes of antibiotics. The loss of effective antibiotics will undermine our ability to fight infectious diseases and manage the infectious complications common in vulnerable patients undergoing chemotherapy for cancer, dialysis for renal failure, and surgery, especially organ transplantation, for which the ability to treat secondary infections is crucial.” What’s causing antibiotic resistance in humans? Overuse of antibiotics in humans? There’s no doubt that antibiotic resistance in humans is a real problem that we must take very seriously and address. There’s also no doubt that, as the CDC report explains, the primary cause of this threat to humans is the inordinate amount of antibiotics being used by people.  But is there enough peer-reviewed scientific evidence to link the judicious use of antibiotics in farm animals to the growing problem of AB resistance in humans? This month a study was published entitled, Modeling the impact of curtailing antibiotic usage in food animals on antibiotic resistance in humans. It states, “Our results suggest that, for a wide range of scenarios, curtailing the volume of antibiotics consumed by food animals has, as a stand-alone measure, little impact on the level of resistance in humans.” Considering the fact that animals have to pass through a withdrawal period before entering the food chain to ensure that any residual antibiotics have passed out of their bodies, that finding is not surprising