Use of veterinary medicine next big EU issue

Irish farmers have become well used to the EU shaping just about every aspect of our farming practice. We are dependent on the CAP for our income and have to do what it takes to ensure we get the payment. It is the same with production. The EU flirts with giving beef import quotas that operate different production regimes yet continues the imposition of a ban on growth-promoting hormones in Europe that was called out by the WTO in 2005 because there was no scientific reason for the ban. There was a near miss earlier this year with the threat of the weedkiller Roundup being banned though its licence was eventually extended to the end of 2017.

The debate to watch out for in the next few years is how antibiotics are used as an animal medicine and the growing risk of antimicrobial resistance (AMR). This occurs when antibiotics being used to treat human illnesses are no longer effective because of a build-up of immunity in the human population. One cause of this is an overuse of antibiotics by the population but the other involves farmers and use in livestock. Antibiotics are used by the veterinary profession to treat infection in much the same way as in the human population and there are specific withdrawal periods that have to be complied with. In the intensive pork and poultry sectors, where the pigs and birds are at much greater risk of infection because of their closed-in environment, antibiotics have been used in a precautionary manner to prevent infection developing.

Recently, an Alliance to Save our Antibiotics report in the UK found a number of samples of chicken in supermarkets that tested positive for antibiotic resistant E coli. There is a strong focus on this issues by the promoters of organic farming and other NGOs such as Compassion in world farming. It is also an opportunity for anti-meat-eating promoters to further their cause and it challenges farming techniques and practices. Of course the various branches of the meat industry are mindful of the issue and have pledged to reducing antibiotic use. The meat industry correctly says that it has as much interest in protecting human health as any other organisation and that included not working to cause antibiotics to become useless.

The debate is at a relatively early stage in terms of future controls. However, it is a matter of concern among public health professionals and particularly among Scandinavian members of the EU. Expect the debate to concentrate on further controls and how antibiotics are to be curtailed in meat production. It will be one in which farmers have to recognise the priority of protecting human health but it has to be impressed on legislators that animal health and welfare are also important.