Special Report

Pork industry takes steps to reduce antibiotic use

Some critics says the livestock industry is not moving fast enough to reduce antibiotic use.  But a top official of the National Pork Producers Council disagrees.

Dr. Howard Hill, Iowa veterinarian and past president of NPPC, says they support FDA Guidance 209 and 213, under which the use of medically-important antibiotics as growth promotants will be phased out by the end of 2016.

“A lot of producers have moved ahead of that already and have either eliminated growth promotants completely or have eliminated the ones that are used in human medicine,” Hill says.

The pork industry is taking those steps, Hill says, even though there is still no evidence that feeding antibiotics to animals has anything to do with resistant bacteria in humans.

In this interview with Brownfield prior to the start of World Pork Expo, Hill also discusses TPA, TPP and COOL in his role as chair of NPPC’s Trade Committee.

AUDIO: Dr. Howard Hill