California's governor Jerry Brown is expected to sign a legislation limiting use of antibiotics for livestock within this week.
Public health advocates said that this move will reduce occurrences of food-borne illness and save lives, Time shared. The landmark California legislation would necessitate farmers to get hold of prescriptions for antibiotic medication.
Moreover, veterinarians would not be allowed from issuing such prescriptions exclusively to promote weight gain. Policy experts said they expect the law to have a widespread impact on agricultural practices across the nation because of California's position as a leading agricultural state.
Farmers usually use antibiotic medicine to speed up animals' growth regardless of whether they are actually sick as this will fight disparaging microorganisms which go into the body. Animals cultivate resistance to the antibiotics due to frequent use of the medicine which could cause them to be more likely effected by bacteria such as E. coli and salmonella.
Being exposed to bacteria resistant to antibiotics can be perilous for humans. As a matter of fact, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimated that more than two million people in the United States get infections which are resistant to antibiotics annually and more than 20,000 of those will die.
CDC official Michael Bell described the problem in an online statement as "approaching a cliff" and said it would now progress on the assumption that antibiotic medicine remains to be overused.
The California legislation is the most recent step forward in the prize fight to limit antibiotics for livestock. Foster Farms, Tyson and McDonald's were among the food retailers which first came forward to put a halt on sourcing red meat from animals which had received antibiotics.
Meanwhile, President Barack Obama is also taking the antibiotic-resistant-bacteria health problems seriously. As a matter of fact, he signed an Executive Order in September to build a task force to develop recommendations in relation to antibiotic resistant bacteria and directed the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to "continue taking steps to eliminate agricultural use of medically important antibiotics for growth-promotion purposes."
