Other Resource 530 Chefs Call On White House To End Antibiotic Overuse On Industrial Farms

This week, The Pew Charitable Trusts delivered a letter signed by 530 chefs (PDF) to Sam Kass, executive director of Let’s Move! and senior policy advisor for nutrition at the White House, urging the Obama administration to finalize policies to preserve the effectiveness of antibiotics and to protect people from resistant superbugs.

Eighty percent of all antibiotics sold in the United States are intended for food animals, often not to treat illness but to compensate for overcrowded conditions and to make the animals grow faster. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recently declared that "much of antibiotic use in animals is unnecessary and inappropriate and makes everyone less safe."