RULES GOVERNING antibiotic use on farm animals have just been tightened across Europe – but the UK has not followed suit.

Campaigners have been pushing for the reduction of agricultural antibiotic use, on the grounds that routinely-dosed intensive livestock create the perfect environment for antibiotic-resistant superbugs to arise, undermining the medicines' value for both humans and animals.

As reported in The Lancet, such antibiotic-resistant bugs were directly responsible for the deaths of more than one and a quarter million people worldwide and linked with the deaths of nearly five million. The overuse of antibiotics in both humans and farm animals is to blame for this crisis – but worldwide about two thirds of antibiotics by volume are used in livestock.

With that threat in mind, the EU has now enacted new legislation banning all forms of routine antibiotic use for farm animals. Farmers on the continent will no longer be allowed to give preventative group antibiotic treatments or use antibiotics to mask poor living conditions and standards for farm animals.

The EU has also banned imports of meat, dairy, fish and eggs that have been produced using antibiotics to stimulate rapid growth in the animals.

However, the UK government – despite repeatedly stating that it largely supports the new EU regulations and has plans to introduce similar laws here – has still not published its own legislative proposals for curbing farm antibiotic use.

So it remains legal in the UK to give antibiotics to farm animals routinely, rather than when they are sick or have an infection, and to import animal foods produced with antibiotic growth promoters.

Despite this, UK farmers have almost halved their antibiotic use over the last decade, and voluntary initiatives have been hailed as successfully taking the industry in the right direction. Campaigners are concerned, however, that the current rash of post-Brexit trade deals might undermine those efforts – a very real threat, given that total farm antibiotic use in both the United States and Canada is five times higher; 16 times higher in Australian poultry and triple what the UK would allow in Australian pigs.

Read more: Dairy farmers asked to share their views on antimicrobial use

The Alliance to Save Our Antibiotics has now written to Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs George Eustice MP, urging the government to bring the UK’s farm antibiotic laws back in line with the EU.

Scientific adviser Cóilín Nunan said: “British farmers have voluntarily reduced their antibiotic use by 50% in recent years. But much larger cuts can still be achieved if the government introduces new laws ending preventative antibiotic group treatments and increasing minimum animal health and welfare standards.

"On the other hand, if the government pursues a trade policy which cuts tariffs on the importation of meat and dairy produced with extremely high antibiotic use, including the use of antibiotic growth promoters, then in order to compete British farmers could be compelled to reduce their own animal health and welfare standards and increase their use of antibiotics.”

The UK government has said that in 2022 it will be consulting on making changes to The Veterinary Medicines Regulations, including changes to the rules governing farm antibiotic use.