Dive Brief:
- In an annual report released Friday, the Food and Drug Administration confirmed a hefty 20% increase in sales of antibiotics used for food animals between 2009 and 2013.
- FDA reported that in 2013, 32.6 million pounds of antibiotics were sold in the U.S. for approved animal use.
- Of the antibiotics sold, more than 60% were sold for medically important reasons.
Dive Insight:
Public health groups continue to come out against the practice of giving animals antibiotics to promote faster growth and prevent disease. According to The Wall Street Journal, some of these groups have requested that President Obama "take more aggressive steps to limit and track the use of antibiotics."
The North American Meat Institute, however, did not take these sales figures into serious account because it says that the report does not confirm how and why the drugs were used on the animals, The Wall Street Journal reports.
Recently, The White House released a "superbug" and antibiotics plan and Reuters reported Costco was seeking to end human antibiotic use in chicken and other meat.