SUBTHERAPEUTIC USE OF ANTIBIOTICS IN ANIMAL FEED: IN LIGHT OF AN UNRESOLVED CLASH OF EXPERT PARADIGMS SHOULD WE PUNT TO THE CONSUMER IN DECADE FOUR?

Abstract

In the early 1970s, the seemingly banal and nondescript matter of the subtherapeutic use of antibiotics in animal feed ignited a contentious debate in policy circles. For three decades now, this issue has periodically surfaced and resubmerged, each time provoking a heated but ultimately unresolved debate regarding the appropriate FDA regulation of the issue. FDA has on several instances taken initial action to find itself quickly restrained either by Congress or by its own ambiguous feelings on the issue. Today, different branches of the Public Health Service, the CDC and the FDA, hold strongly divergent views on this issue and even the Center for Veterinary Medicine, the Division of the FDA responsible for regulating the manufacture and distribution of animal feed additives, appears to house a range of opinion.