Tuesday, April 28, 2015 - The recently released FDA report on antimicrobial sales for use in food-producing animals has some interesting figures but is somewhat ambiguous in that it does not include information on how products actually are used, such as in what species or for prevention, control or treatment of disease. For example, some products are labeled for companion animals as well as food producing animals and the distribution of these uses is not reported to the FDA. Because of all these variations, FDA notes in the report, assumptions cannot be made about actual product use.

The findings did report that:

·      Domestic sales and distribution of medically important antimicrobials approved for use in food-producing animals increased by 20 percent from 2009 through 2013, and increased by 3 percent from 2012 through 2013.

·       Over-the-counter (OTC) sales of medically important antimicrobials approved for use in food-producing animals did not appreciably change from 2009 through 2013.

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