Slaughter on White House Summit on Antibiotics, Responsible Federal Meat Sourcing

Press Release

Today, in light of the announcement of a Presidential Memorandum creating a preference for meat and poultry produced according to responsible antibiotic-use policies, Congresswoman Slaughter released the following statement:

The Presidential Memorandum directing federal departments and agencies to establish a preference for meat raised with responsible use of antibiotics is a significant step in the right direction, and one that I called for nearly a year ago. Rest assured that I will be monitoring the implementation of this process to see that these promises become reality and that there is real change in the use of antibiotics. To that end, "responsible use" must still be defined more strictly and not allow antibiotics in the daily feed and water of healthy animals under the guise of "disease prevention." Meat and poultry producers can and should change their practices so that animals are not unnecessarily prone to disease and antibiotics are therefore only used when absolutely necessary.

In July of last year, Congresswoman Slaughter, the only microbiologist in Congress and the leader on antibiotic resistance, released a letter to the Obama Administration calling for this specific change. The letter reads in part, "given the seriousness of the antibiotic resistance crisis, I urge you to draft an executive order to combat antibiotic resistance with the following actions: commit all federal purchases of meat to be meat raised without antibiotics, or certified by a third-party that any antibiotics administered were only used on sick or injured animals."

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