FDA Bans Baytril in Poultry

The Food and Drug Administration is banning the use of Bayer Corp.'s Baytril in chickens, fearing the practice poses health risks for humans. The agency's veterinary medicine division had first sought its removal in 2000.
It's the first time the agency has ended the use of an animal drug because of fears that it could lead to antibiotic-resistant pathogens in humans.
The FDA's standard is that food from animals that have taken a particular drug must carry a "reasonable certainty of no harm," and the agency didn't feel that poultry treated with Baytril met that standard, an FDA spokesman said.
"Scientific data ... showed that the use of (Baytril) in poultry caused resistance to emerge in Campylobacter, a bacterium that causes foodborne illness. Chickens and turkeys normally harbor Campylobacter in their digestive tracts without causing poultry to become ill," the agency said in a statement.