Bacteria that resist 'last antibiotic' found in UK

Holding the government to such optimistic standards is blatantly a straw man. We both know how little gets done unless money is involved, and unfortunately for us all, the animal agriculture business has incredible political power.

I challenge your assertion you avoid antibiotic animal products altogether - an impractical and unverifiable way to discourage the use of antibiotics. If you are serious, consider how purchasing meat, etc. directly leads to "deforestation ... lack of fresh water" without bias. Shaming isn't necessary, just educate yourself and others.

That study -- which is merely a meta-study of 26 selected other studies -- just summarizes the incidence rates of resistant strains in migrant populations vs. local populations. It seems unsurprising to me that immigrants from countries with poor public health systems tend to be sicker than we are and we should probably intensify our efforts to aid them in that regard.

It makes no claim with respects to how relevant any of this is with respect to the overall increase in the occurrence of resistant strains. I'm not a doctor, I don't know how relevant this is, if at all. Clearly, being able to claim that immigrants spread disease fits a certain political agenda.

The U.K. has seen unprecedented inflows in the last year (640K immigrants)

With approximately 310k leaving, in other words, net migration is 330k[0]. But it sure is fun to quote the higher number! Of the ~640k, ~300k are coming to work (2/3 of them with a job offer), and 180k are coming to study. Since EU citizens are free to move around, unsurprisingly most of the immigrants (and, I presume, the emigrants) are from other EU countries.

On the other hand, the UK is doing comparatively little in terms of letting asylum seekers enter the country, despite being one of the richest countries on the planet in the middle of one of a humanitarian crisis: With almost a million people having crossed the Mediterranean as refugees and migrants so far this year, and conflicts in Syria and elsewhere continuing to generate staggering levels of human suffering, 2015 is likely to exceed all previous records for global forced displacement, the UN Refugee Agency warned in a new report today.[1]

[0] The number is "unprecedented" in so far as that it's 10k or 3% higher than the one in 2005, which as we all know left Britain reeling in anarchy and destitution. http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/aug/27/net-migration...

[1] Staggering levels of human suffering. http://www.unhcr.org/5672c2576.html

"Political will"?

That's an interesting way to describe a dictatorship!

The problem I think he is trying to point out, is that the regulatory agencies are controlled by those businesses in the first place. The FDA tried to regulate antibiotics in farm use decades ago, and the industry threw a fit until it stopped. They tried again awhile ago, and they fought against them until they made compliance voluntary.

If the only regulations you can have are ones which benefit big businesses, then no regulations at all might be better. You can't have a political ideology based around the idea that the government is perfectly competent and incorruptible.

Instead another alternative might be to get rid of the FDA entirely so new antibiotics can be developed faster, and we can genetically modify animals to breed them to grow bigger without antibiotics.

Well that only might work, and only in this one specific case. In general regulations can definitely be necessary. But they've proven they can't solve this problem, or at least not until the last minute when it might be too late. And even if we were successful, you can't stop other countries from doing it.

>The left enacts policies to alter the demographics of a nation in ways that will virtually guarantee them electoral success, and then they loudly decry anyone who criticizes these policies as a "racist," "xenophobe," or something similar

Yes... because they are. Because most liberals believe that everyone, regardless of nationality, ethnicity, or creed, deserves equal opportunity. And because they believe in diversity, and compassion, and discriminating or restricting immigration flies in the face of these principles.

>and then they even have the nerve to write boastful articles like the ones I linked to above

Yes, how dare they celebrate their successes and growing support. What monsters...

You act like this is some sort of "gotcha" paradox. It's not. It's perfectly consistent.

>to support the mass importation of homophobic, misogynist, and devoutly religious Muslims,

First, you are being racist and xenophobic here. You are stereotyping immigrants and you are supporting discrimination against them based on this.

Second, you are assuming that everyone shares your racist and xenophobic prejudices. Being against gay marriage, or being a devout Muslim are not reasons in my mind to restrict immigration, even though I think opposing gay marriage is discriminatory and that Islam is a dumb religion. Because I know that this country (USA) has opportunities for a better life than most of the world, and we should grant those opportunities to as many people as is sustainable, something which we aren't even close to achieving.

It is called compassion. And defending liberty. It is the foundation of the country, to accept the downtrodden from all over the world. It is the reason that the vast majority of the population is even on this continent in the first place.

You sound exactly like a 50's racist ranting about how segregation is ending solely because of a political plot to gain black votes, or someone from even earlier ranting about "those damn Papist Irish" taking over in a conspiracy for the Pope to rule the US.

Grow up, sometimes the world isn't as disgustingly cynical as you'd like to believe.