[Editorial] Care Needed Using Antibiotics on Animals
Yesterday the country saw the release of detailed figures regarding the frequency with which antibiotics are prescribed to people with colds, and they confirmed Korea’s disgraceful position as an “antibiotics-abusing nation.” Far too many hospitals and clinics prescribe antibiotics in a reckless fashion. “Neighborhood clinics” are the worst, issuing the stuff to 61.7 percent of their consultations, and university hospitals do so in the lowest percentage (40 percent) of cases. The situation is better at big hospitals, but it is still too serious compared to advanced nations.
The problem with the overuse of antibiotics is that new bacteria appear that are resistant to them. The cost of fighting antibiotic-resistant bacteria has rapidly increased in the past twenty years. They say that globally it costs more than US$100 billion yearly, and numerous lives are lost because they cannot develop new medicines for fighting the resistant bacteria fast enough. AIDS, malaria, and tuberculosis are especially resistant. When such bacteria spread to nature it ruins ecosystems. They spread quickly because of the active pace of international exchange, and resistance to antibiotics is becoming an international problem.
What is of the greatest urgency is making hospitals use antibiotics with less frequency, but something else that must not be neglected is the use of antibiotics on plants and animals. Resistant bacteria sometimes gets transferred from animals such as livestock to humans, so reducing hospital use of antibiotics is not everything. Europe and the United States have already started to regulate the use of antibiotics on animals. Korea needs to study the situation and find ways to reduce use on plants and animals as well.
Antibiotic-resistant bacteria are like a bomb that could go off at any time. The government, the medical community, and the whole of society need to participate in the effort to see to it that antibiotics are used with care. It must be remembered that it will already be too late when nature starts to get its revenge.
The Hankyoreh, 11 February 2006.
[Translations by Seoul Selection]