Discussing the Fallacies of Attacks on Agriculture in Relation to Antibiotic Use Pt.1

Discussing the Fallacies of Attacks on Agriculture in Relation to Antibiotic Use Pt.1

I recently watched a special on PBS Frontline entitled "The Troubles with Antibiotics." To be honest, it's hard for me to sit and watch programs like these, with such a blatant desire to attribute things the general public does not understand to sources which seem evil and scary (I am unfortunately talking about modern agriculture, which has appeared that way to many in modern times due to successful smear campaigns based almost entirely on fiction).

What I found most shocking came quite quickly during the program, with unsubstantiated claims from a microbiologist in Arizona. He claimed using antibiotics in our food animals caused resistant infections. This claim came moments after he was disucssing his hypothesis, yes his hypothesis, a theory. The program made NO attempt to prove anything further from there, either. 

The program even mentioned, just five minutes later, that the issue of a direct link between antibiotic use and human resistance is "still the question today." How can you fairly prop up the opinions of a researcher, while also negating his claims in what I see as the fine print? Yes, the program mentioned the true statement, antiobotics have provided no link, but when they mentioned that, it was during a segway, with a very uninteresting woman on camera. When they let the microbiologist speak, it was with images of raw meat and with clips of hospitals. 

Plain and simple, this is propaganda.

I am planning to do some additional reaseach this week (midterms are finally done) and I will post a longer and more in-depth blog adressing the propoganda related to false calims of  harmful antiobtic use in production animals.

-John L. Hawley