At least a third of antibiotics produced in the United States, however, are dispensed not to people at all, but to livestock. Some are used to treat sick animals, but farmers, particularly poultry farmers, will often give antibiotics to an entire chicken house when not all of the birds are sick. The only thing a grower can do is add it to the water and treat the whole house. Not surprisingly, such widespread use of antibiotics in livestock has promoted drug-resistant strains of once easily treatable bacteria found in meat and poultry. The Centers for Disease Control reported that resistant strains of bacteria that cause food poisoning have increased for the third consecutive year.
Salmonella is present in a fifth of all broiler chickens sold.
During last week's hearing, the FDA moved to ban the poultry industry's use of quinolones and proposed more careful scrutiny of other antibiotics. Any signs of antibiotic-resistant bacteria will lead to a moratorium on farm use of the particular drug, according to the proposed regulation. More importantly, the FDA's regulations will have to receive congressional approval before becoming law, and given the recent fondness of the livestock, poultry, and pharmaceutical manufacturing industries for Republicans, we're unlikely to see sweeping regulatory changes in the next four years. All three industries gave over seventy percent of their political contributions to Republicans in the 2000 election cycle, which added up to over twenty million dollars. The incoming president was the top political beneficiary of all three industries' munificence.