China tops world for antibiotics use
Print Edition
CHINA was the world’s biggest consumer of antibiotics in 2013, gobbling down 162,000 tons of them, or almost half the global total, a recent study said.
The research by the Guangzhou Institute of Geochemistry under the Chinese Academy of Sciences — the results of which were published yesterday on the People’s Daily website — said humans accounted for 48 percent of the total consumption and animals the remainder.
The total is more than 150 times the amount consumed in the United Kingdom and 10 times the United States’ figure, the study said.
The overuse of antibiotics can be dangerous to people’s health as it allows bacteria to build up resistance, which in turn makes the drugs less efficacious.
It can also cause environmental problems, as many of the drugs end up in the country’s waterways after being expelled from the bodies of people and animals, said lead researcher Ying Guangguo.
About 50,000 tons of antibiotics are discharged into waterways and the soil every year in China, the report said.
The study, which was first published last month in the US journal Environmental Science & Technology, is one of the first into China’s antibiotics “problem.”
Many of the findings were based on water samples taken from 58 of China’s rivers.
Waterways in northern regions, including Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei Province, were found to have high concentrations of antibiotics, followed by the Pearl River Delta in the south, and the Yangtze River Delta, Ying said.
The average level across all of China’s rivers was 30 and 15 times the levels in Italy and Germany respectively.
The worst of the pollution was reported in areas that are densely populated and have lots of farms, the study said.
Antibiotics are often added to animal feed to accelerate growth and fight disease.
China’s lack of regulations governing the use of the drugs at poultry and pig farms is a major problem, Ying said.
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