Antimicrobial Resistance- A Global Problem For Animals and Humans

Australian Veterinary Association

Australia’s peak veterinary body, the Australian Veterinary Association (AVA), says the veterinary profession has long been proactive in working alongside human health experts to fight antibiotic resistance at every opportunity.

Antimicrobial Resistance – from awareness to action, is the theme of World Veterinary Day on April 29th and it highlights the important role that vets play in ensuring responsible use of antimicrobials in farm animals and in pets.

AVA spokesperson, Dr Stephen Page, said veterinarians recognize that antibiotics are important medicines that can help treat bacterial disease in animals and prevent associated suffering in pets, livestock, and other animals.

“From an animal health and welfare perspective, it’s critical that veterinarians retain access to these essential medications, and that they prescribe them responsibly. Unfortunately, on a global scale, we’ve seen the overuse and misuse of life-saving medications in both humans and animals. Antibiotic resistance is a naturally occurring phenomenon, but the overuse of these medications has significantly accelerated AMR selection and spread. As a result, the world is rapidly reaching a point where we are in danger of seeing more people dying from infections, due to antibiotic resistance, than from cancer,” Dr Page said.

Fortunately, Australia is part of a select group of countries including Iceland, New Zealand, Sweden and Finland that have a low-level of use of antibiotics in animals compared with much of the rest of the world, and levels of important resistances are low.

“Australian veterinarians have judicious use guidelines in place that inform their use of antibiotics. These guidelines help to ensure we’re not overprescribing or misusing antibiotics. The key for vets is to work with farmers and pet owners every day to prevent illness and disease in Australian animals by ensuring best practice infection prevention and control and providing nutritious diets, vaccinations, good husbandry, and stress free environments. A healthy animal does not require antibiotics, so the aim is wherever possible to keep animals fit and healthy,” he said.

Resistant bugs can transfer to humans from contaminated food preparation areas and via undercooked food, so good hygiene in food preparation and proper cooking should be practised at home – using a food thermometer can be invaluable too! Resistant bugs can also transfer between people and animals through close contact so proper hygiene and hand washing is important when in close contact with animals whether or not they have been treated with antibiotics.

“Antibiotic resistance is a global problem and requires international collaboration across multiple disciplines if we’re to reduce the problem beyond our own country and to make sure, for example, that travelers returning to Australia do not bring home antibiotic-resistant bugs,” Dr Page said.