Recently, a coalition of public health and environmental advocates petitioned the Food and Drug Administration to ban the routine use of antibiotics in factory farms. A ban will go into effect in the European Union in 2006. Two years ago, the World Health Organization recommended a worldwide phase-out.

Two thirds of all antibiotics in the U.S. are used in factory farms to promote the animals’ growth and to contain infectious diseases induced by extreme crowding and stress. This practice can cause bacterial resistance to antibiotics to develop in consumers and jeopardizes the ability to treat human infections.

The U.S. Public Health Service estimates that millions of Americans are affected and up to 9,000 killed by food-borne infectious diseases.

Whatever happened to the good old days when eating meat was linked only with heart disease, cancer, stroke and other chronic killers?

The FDA should ban the routine use of antibiotics in factory farms to enhance their effectiveness for consumers addicted to meat and other animal products. The rest of us should simply replace these products with vegetables, fresh fruits and grains. These foods contain all the nutrients we require, without the deadly pathogens, antibiotics, carcinogens, cholesterol and saturated fats. They are touted by every health advocacy group and were the recommended fare in the Garden of Eden.

Lawrence Rangel, Lewiston

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