The researchers could not determine how the boy became infected with salmonella. There was no evidence he consumed contaminated meat or came into contact with contaminated animal feces. Although the salmonella strain isolated from the boy matched a strain in one herd, the match was apparently not from the family s herd. The researchers reported the boy did not accompany his father on visits to the other herds during the two-week period before his illness. So how the boy became infected with salmonella is a mystery.
Cattle can acquire salmonella from birds or other wildlife.
There wasn t even any evidence the cattle were treated with ceftriaxone, the antibiotic in question, or any other antibiotics. None of this prevented the researchers from pronouncing the use of antibiotics in livestock should be restricted or that such use was a public health problem. The fault for exposing the public to this misinformation lies squarely with the New England Journal of Medicine. Studies should be peer reviewed by independent experts before publication. It is difficult to believe that was the case here.