DTN AgDayta | Oct. 31, 2001 Health, consumer, agricultural and environmental groups Tuesday launched a campaign to urge the government to ban the "overuse" of antibiotics in farm animals and to persuade Bayer, the manufacturer of Cipro, to comply with an FDA proposed ban on the use of Baytril, a similar antibiotic in sick poultry. The anthrax threat reminds us how important antibiotics are," said Dr. Tamara Barlam, director of the Project on Antibiotic Resistance of the Center for Science in the Public Interest, at a luncheon for reporters at the National Press Club. "Throughout the country, physicians are reporting difficulty treating potentially life-threatening infections caused by bacteria that have become resistant to antibiotics," she added. Other members of the Keep Antibiotics Working coalition include Environmental Defense, the Humane Society of the United States, the Sierra Club and the Union of Concerned Scientists. The groups say they are not opposed to the use of antibiotics to treat sick animals, but oppose the use of antibiotics to help the animals digest food more efficiently and to keep them from getting sick. "A number of antibiotics used in agriculture are identical or very similar to antibiotics used in human medical treatment. These include antibiotics routinely fed to healthy animals as well as ones given to entire flocks of poultry, even if only a few birds are sick," the coalition said in a statement. DTN AgDayta:
