03/20/07 Antibiotics

The use of antibiotics in agriculture is coming under greater scrutiny. Dr. Liz Wagstrom - Pork Checkoff Assistant Vice President of Science and Technology - says a better understanding about antibiotic usage is important. That's why the Pork Checkoff has developed three new brochures on the issue. WAGSTROM: They're focused at a lay-audience so people who don't understand the pork industry or who don't know a lot about it. Our expectation s that producers could use these brochures to share with their neighbors or people within their community that have questions about antibiotic use. There is a general brochure that answers common questions about antibiotics. Wagstrom says the second brochure explains what happened when Denmark banned the sub-therapeutic use of antibiotic growth promotants in pork production. WAGSTROM: We hear that a lot from people who have concerns about antibiotic use that we' they banned them in Denmark and it had no health effects or no effects in Denmark when indeed there were effects to both the health of the herd as well as increased therapeutic antibiotic use. So the Denmark example of what happens when you ban growth promotants is probably something that we can use to show what would happen in the United States. And then the third brochure covers an introduction to the "Take Care- Use Antibiotics Responsively" program so that those outside the pork industry understand that we do understand there are concerns about antibiotic use. We've developed a set of guidelines that producers can follow to protect both public health and the animals health by using the antibiotics responsively and that there is a thoughtful process in place to address the issue of antibiotic use. According to Wagstrom - these brochures explain the basic facts about antibiotics in pork production and will help producers explain their use. WAGSTROM: We expect that our operation main street, producers will us these a lot as well as people who may be going into citing hearings, those who have county health boards who may have questions. They're well referenced brochures so there are scientific references provided but they're in very straight forward language that is not going to be complicated and difficult to understand. To order a brochure online - contact the Pork Checkoff Service Center. For more information - go to Pork dot org or call 800-456-PORK. That's today's Line On Agriculture. I'm Greg Martin on the Northwest Ag Information Network.