> Dukes believes, though he has no evidence, that the bacteria in his gut became drug-resistant because he ate meat from animals raised with routine antibiotic use. That would not be difficult: most meat in the United States is grown that way. To varying degrees depending on their size and age, cattle, pigs, and chickens — and, in other countries, fish and shrimp — receive regular doses to speed their growth, increase their weight, and protect them from disease. Out of all the antibiotics sold in the United States each year, 80 percent by weight are used in agriculture, primarily to fatten animals and protect them from the conditions in which they are raised.
I really don't like to generalise in this way, but this sort of stuff makes me, as a European, pretty angry at the general laissez-faire attitude of the United States towards such things.
You may say "The US is allowed to govern itself as it wishes, no one's forcing you to live there" - but with its heavy use of antibiotics in cattle-raising (banned in the EU - even though the US has tried to use its muscle to get the EU to un-ban it), the US is basically doing a fantastic job of fucking up antibiotics for everyone. So yes, I'm angry at the United States and its corrupt political system that means that there's almost zero chance that any of this will be fixed until it's far too late.
China is in fact by far the biggest problem regarding antibiotics.
So while you're busy being angry, don't forget to spread that anger around.
"Last month, the country's Ministry of Health revealed that on average each Chinese person consumes 138 g of antibiotics per year — 10 times the amount consumed per capita in the U.S. "
For those keeping track at home, that's about 41 times the total use of antibiotics in China compared to the US due to their population size.
I think the difference is that the problem of antibiotics overuse in US agriculture is amenable to a relatively simple regulatory situation: making a law banning or limiting antibiotics use in livestock. Addressing the issue in China, on the other hand, would require overhaul of the entire medical system, as hospitals are dependent on antibiotics sales for a significant proportion of their revenue.
I went with a friend to a hospital in Shanghai once, and the doctor ran a blood test and found that my friend had a viral infection. He then attempted to sell her antibiotics (which anyone who's done even high school biology knows are completely ineffective against viruses, only against bacteria). I called him out on it, and he just scowled at me and muttered 'westerners do things differently'.
The above argument is not whataboutism. The statement "the US is basically doing a fantastic job of fucking up antibiotics for everyone" is false because no policy change in the US will significantly affect the rate at which resistant strains appear worldwide, US antibiotics consumption being less than 3% of China's. This refutes the original argument by bringing in additional information, whereas whataboutism is defined as changing the subject "without directly refuting or disproving the opponent's initial argument."
Hey, libertarianism is great! Down with the state!
I get actually more pissed off with libertarian cargo-culting than with current government regulation. As much as government is in bed with big corps, it's so much easier to get to an antibiotic ban with a government capable of enforcing it than with a withered state.
Because when I think "federal department held in thrall by the forces of small government", I think the United States Department of Agriculture, and their notorious resistance to massive subsidies and stubborn refusal to issue guidance. I mean, my goodness, the USDA's budget has shrunk every year for the last 20 years! Dastardly Libertarians!
...
Face it... this is not a shrunken, cowardly government quivering in fear of the mighty Libertarian Lobby and their massive and well-coordinated .4% of the vote. This is an already strong government showing you why you can't simply count on a strong government to give you your every whim.
Before one can criticize the actions of a "withered state", shouldn't we first have one? If you insist that the current state is withered, then it is only withered due to the actions of big government collapsing under the weight of its own contradictions because the government has been firmly under the control of Big Government types for the past 6 years at least and arguably beyond that (Bush was no small government advocate), and, well, if you want to go that route I'm game but I'm not sure you are.
(Frankly the efforts to pin blame on Libertarians, who have basically no power, whiffs of desperation.)
Update: Well, I think I can be forgiven for not being intimately familiar with the Byzantine Federal government. It appears to be the FDA that already had the power to regulate this and wasn't using it, rather than the USDA: http://www.politico.com/story/2013/12/fda-meat-antibiotics-1... The article doesn't mention anything about this requiring a new law, so it appears to be something they've had the power to do for a while... they just didn't. The FDA is also, of course, well known for being gunshy with their regulations because of the mighty power of the Libertarians.
It's not the libertarians specifically, it's the idea that governments are incapable of improving anything, which has much broader support.
The EU ban on this practice has been effective. Whatever it is that makes the US government incapable of enforcing a similar ban, it's clear that it's not because goverments as a rule are incapable of such things.
No one educated on the issue is criticizing that governments are able to effect positive change. It's that our governments are setup in a way that ineffectually compromises balance with shortsighted popular political stunts & corruption via dealings in secrecy.
I know this is a major tangent but if we want government to represent us, we have to change it in simple ways.
- Force living standards of the middle class onto them. No special treatment like elevated healthcare and huge pensions. They're not kings, the world won't end if they die a shitty death like the rest of us.
- Tie their wages to the average middle class citizen. That way they're rewarded for improving the living standard of most of the country.
- Retirement after office. No chance for lobbying. No bribing them with cushy jobs+bonuses after their term of exploitation.
- Creating a voting system that actually works. Stop this popularity contest BS and genuine altruistic leaders.
- Mandatory factual education per-requisite for voting for specific areas of expertise. No one should be able to vote until they meet a threshold of competency and comprehension of the candidates. These tests should be by a unbiased third party non-profit.
- Make the lives of representatives activities completely public, in real-time. It was their choice to represent hundreds of millions of people. They need to sacrifice their freedom for our own.
Bet this would fix a lot given most of these issues we're getting ourselves into are human problems rather than ideological problems. I would also like to see basic income be tried on a large scale for once, that'd be interesting.
It's a vicious cycle. Americans believe that governments are incapable of improving anything because the U.S. government (both Federal and state levels) is notoriously corrupt and incompetent. This in turn causes Americans to be apathetic about fixing their government.
Drug resistant bacteria (by the articles own numbers) has killed less people per year than if you were to amortize the cost in lives of Germany's very-powerful state (and then you can add the 49-78,000,000 people killed by Mao). I, for one, am proud that Libertarians look for ways to avoid coercion and want to promote voluntary means. Bans don't work for drugs - I hope people have realized this by now...
Sorry, but I find the "its such a good idea! lets force everyone to do it!" mentality quite irritating. Most solutions come from outside government. Instead of throwing huge capital at a fruitless ban, we should instead use the money on useful research. (such as the link about bacteriophages below: http://www.metafilter.com/134210/Imagining-the-Post-Antibiot...) Or even an educational campaign.
ah yes this emerging threat currently kills fewer people in a single year than an entire genocidal campaign did over the course of six. excellent point, as i'm sure deaths from previously preventable infections are sure to only drop in the future. we wouldn't want to coerce large scale farmers running indisputably torturous husbandry operations into preventing a spike in infant mortality now!
by the way, the phage therapy described in the comment you linked was largely developed by the soviets. lol
> ah yes this emerging threat currently kills fewer people in a single year than an entire genocidal campaign did over the course of six.
That's not what I said. You can multiply the yearly number by 100 (antibiotics were discovered less than 100 years ago) and still not touch the number of lives lost to overly powerful states.
as a side note: thanks for the link on bacteriophages. very cool
> by the way, the phage therapy described in the comment you linked was largely developed by the soviets. lol
Definitely lol! From the link:
"While d’Herelle is said to have been initially enamored with communism, he was soon soured on it when Eliava was suddenly kidnapped, murdered, and denounced by Beria (it likely had as much to do with Beria demonstrating that even Heroes of Soviet Science were not immune to his power..."
Its no surprise that scientists still tried to save lives despite the state - not because of it.
Not having useful drugs against bacterial infections has killed many more people in the past than all violent governments combinded. Because bacteria infections where the number one killer for centuries.
Do you similarly disagree with vaccination? After all, that is also a government-led imposition for the greater good of improving the population's health.
I really don't like to generalise in this way, but this sort of stuff makes me, as a European, pretty angry at the general laissez-faire attitude of the United States towards such things.
You may say "The US is allowed to govern itself as it wishes, no one's forcing you to live there" - but with its heavy use of antibiotics in cattle-raising (banned in the EU - even though the US has tried to use its muscle to get the EU to un-ban it), the US is basically doing a fantastic job of fucking up antibiotics for everyone. So yes, I'm angry at the United States and its corrupt political system that means that there's almost zero chance that any of this will be fixed until it's far too late.