The overuse of antibiotics is creating highly resistant superbugs. Without urgent action, we’re heading for a post-antibiotic era, in which important medicines stop working and common infections and minor injuries can once again kill. By 2050, drug resistant infections are predicted to kill 10 million people a year – more than the number of people that die from cancer today.
Antibiotic resistance is a global public health crisis. Overuse of antibiotics in farming contributes massively to this problem; almost two thirds of the world’s antibiotics are administered to farm animals, often to offset stressful and unsanitary living conditions and speed growth rather than to treat illness. Residues of these antibiotics pass through the food chain to consumers.
With almost 100,000 restaurants worldwide, McDonald’s, Subway and KFC have massive buying power, which could make a big difference to the global supply chain. If they all banned antibiotics from their supply chains, the amount of antibiotics used globally would be dramatically reduced.
Our Antibiotics off the Menu campaign is putting pressure on the largest restaurant chains to stop using meat raised with medically important antibiotics.
A coalition of NGOs, scientists and doctors, led by Consumers International, published an open letter to the CEOs of McDonalds, Subway and KFC, calling for global commitments to end the routine use of all antibiotics included on the World Health Organization (WHO)’s list of important antimicrobials, across all of the companies’ supply chains.
In addition to our campaigning activities, we play an active role on the Codex Committee on Residues of Veterinary Drugs in Food (CCRVDF), so that we can safeguard consumers’ wellbeing in relation to the use of antibiotics in the food supply chain.
Consumers International attended the eighth session of the Intergovernmental Group of Experts (IGE) in Geneva, advising the United Nations. We discussed enhancing the consumer movement, and the IGE’s Agreed Conclusions encouraged member states to support this. We also highlighted consumer voices in food, competition law, policy, and redress.
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I recently had the privilege of representing Consumers International at the 4th meeting of the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee (INC-4) - where member states are tasked with a monumental challenge - to develop an international legally binding instrument on plastic pollution.
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