WHO urges end to antibiotics use in healthy food-producing animals

The World Health Organization (WHO) launched new guidelines regarding the use of antimicrobials in food-producing animals, urging farmers and the food industry to stop using antibiotics to promote growth and prevent disease in otherwise healthy animals.

The guidelines were announced ahead of World Antibiotic Awareness Week, Nov. 13-19.

The WHO recommends an overall reduction in the use of all classes of medically important antibiotics in food-producing animals, including complete restriction of these antibiotics for growth promotion and disease prevention without diagnosis.

Healthy animals should receive antibiotics only to prevent disease if it has been diagnosed in other animals in the same flock, herd, or fish population, according to the WHO.

The new guidelines aim to help preserve the effectiveness of antibiotics important for human medicine. They recommend that antibiotics used in animals should be among those that are the least important to human health, and not from those classified as “critically important.”

The European Union barred the practice in 2006, and a US ban on use of “medically important” antibiotics kicked in at the beginning of this year, according to the WHO.

“A lack of effective antibiotics is as serious a security threat as a sudden and deadly disease outbreak,” said Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO director general. “Strong, sustained action across all sectors is vital if we are to turn back the tide of antimicrobial resistance and keep the world safe.”

The WHO also recommends improving hygiene, better use of vaccination, and changes in animal housing and husbandry practices as alternatives to using antibiotics in animals for disease prevention.

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