Farm animals in India and China are becoming more resistant to antibiotics • Hacker News Board

Re: Farm animals in India and China are becoming more resistant to antibiotics

#41

Post by warent » Mon, Sep 23, 2019, 4:44 PM UTC

alexfromapex wrote: post #32

Can we please stop overusing antibiotics? They are essentially dangerous organic weapons we don’t understand

That would mean less livestock farming, which means people would have to accept a life with less meat. It's simply not going to happen. Humans are way too arrogant and inflexible to impose the smallest inconvenience on themselves unless faced with tangible, immediately harmful effects. Not to mention the complete shift in the global economy that it would demand. I've been a vegetarian for about 4 years and the cognitive dissonance you start to see is remarkable. People claim to love animals and hate animal cruelty through mouthfuls of burger and pork.

Re: Farm animals in India and China are becoming more resistant to antibiotics

#42

Post by StreamBright » Mon, Sep 23, 2019, 4:45 PM UTC

ddeck wrote: post #13

StreamBright wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We need a new drug platform because the current model only satisfy the owners of the pharma corporations.

I recently listened to a podcast featuring Dr Matt McCarthy, who is an infection diseases physician and ethics professor and who authored the book Superbugs[1]. He did a good job (to a layperson such as myself anyway) of explaining why big pharma don't have much incentive to develop new antibiotics, possible financial interventions that may makes sense, and the alternative treatments that are being developed. I haven…

Yep, I agree with him. Without the right incentives we are dead in the water.

Re: Farm animals in India and China are becoming more resistant to antibiotics

#43

Post by StreamBright » Mon, Sep 23, 2019, 4:47 PM UTC

airstrike wrote: post #16

StreamBright wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We need a new drug platform because the current model only satisfy the owners of the pharma corporations.

this has nothing to do with how Big Pharma develops drugs...

It has everything to do how pharma develops drugs and what are the incentives around medicine that we give to them.

Re: Farm animals in India and China are becoming more resistant to antibiotics

#44

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Sep 23, 2019, 4:54 PM UTC

[deleted]

Re: Farm animals in India and China are becoming more resistant to antibiotics

#45

Post by gwbas1c » Mon, Sep 23, 2019, 4:59 PM UTC

kryogen1c wrote: post #9

Source paper https://science.sciencemag.org/content/365/6459/eaaw1944.ful... >From 2000 to 2018, the proportion of antimicrobial compounds with resistance higher than 50% (P50) increased from 0.15 to 0.41 in chickens and from 0.13 to 0.34 in pigs and plateaued between 0.12 and 0.23 in cattle. >Globally, 73% of all antimicrobials sold on Earth are used in animals raised for food. Jeeeesus. It sure feels like humanity…

Nothing new here, it started when we realized we're naked.

Before we invented artificial fertilizer, we were legitimately afraid that we're run out of land to grow food.

Re: Farm animals in India and China are becoming more resistant to antibiotics

#46

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Sep 23, 2019, 5:00 PM UTC

prongletown wrote: post #7

I've been a vegetarian for a few years. Part of the impetus for my choice was the lack of regulation and health code standards in this country. Recent news that the federal government is reducing inspection of meat really does scare me. How many people need to die (like in the early 1900s) before we re-realize the importance of these regulations on public life? When will the next Upton Sinclair come along?

[deleted]

Re: Farm animals in India and China are becoming more resistant to antibiotics

#47

Post by josephorjoe » Mon, Sep 23, 2019, 5:11 PM UTC

Dumblydorr wrote: post #36

rwj wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's rational for the individual is not always well aligned with what's rational for the society.

There are negative externalities, in other words, and a truly well functioning economy would align bad behavior with higher costs, surely we can get there...?

Not without government regulation.

Businesses never regulate themselves before the disaster because it is always more profitable to use the "there won't be a disaster" scenario plan.

Re: Farm animals in India and China are becoming more resistant to antibiotics

#48

Post by ajdegol » Mon, Sep 23, 2019, 5:11 PM UTC

kryogen1c wrote: post #19

whenchamenia wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Its simple to get to know your local rancher. You can even voice your concerns and have them heard by the person raising your beef, while walking the ranch on a nkce day. Factory farms are the bigger problem, not just meat per-se.

> Its simple to get to know your local rancher. >Factory farms are the bigger problem, not just meat per-se. Not just meat farms! One thing vegans and vegetarians often gloss over is the death per calorie involved in crop fields. Those thousands of acres have animals in them, and the machines sure dont stop for every varmit that gets in the way. It is not clear what the right answer is (assuming all you care about is…

"One thing vegans and vegetarians often gloss over" how very scientific of you.

Re: Farm animals in India and China are becoming more resistant to antibiotics

#49

Post by smn1234 » Mon, Sep 23, 2019, 5:11 PM UTC

wonderwonder wrote: post #10

"the four types of antimicrobial drug most commonly used in farm animals to help them gain weight — tetracyclines, sulfonamides, quinolones and penicillins — are also the ones with highest resistance rates." It never ceases to amaze me the decisions that we as a species make with full knowledge of the consequences that seem to be geared towards implementing wide spread disaster. We as a species have very much decided…

and what happens to the shareholder value? /sarcasm

Re: Farm animals in India and China are becoming more resistant to antibiotics

#50

Post by Andrex » Mon, Sep 23, 2019, 5:12 PM UTC

kryogen1c wrote: post #9

Source paper https://science.sciencemag.org/content/365/6459/eaaw1944.ful... >From 2000 to 2018, the proportion of antimicrobial compounds with resistance higher than 50% (P50) increased from 0.15 to 0.41 in chickens and from 0.13 to 0.34 in pigs and plateaued between 0.12 and 0.23 in cattle. >Globally, 73% of all antimicrobials sold on Earth are used in animals raised for food. Jeeeesus. It sure feels like humanity…

> Im not sure we've ever been powerfull enough to be truly as in danger as we are now.

I mean when the Black Death comes along and mops up 30-60% of a continent's entire population in half a decade, you get a little more respect for how terrifying nature has manifested in history...

With that said, we've been two key turns and a button press away from total annihilation since the mid-1950s when the US and Soviets started assembling their nuclear stockpiles.

The fact society still exists past the Cuban Missile Crisis should be considered history's greatest miracle.