On this week’s AnimalAgCast, Lizzy Schultz sat down with Dr. Dave Pyburn, Vice President of Science and Technology for the National Pork Board, to discuss the organization’s ongoing commitment to antibiotic stewardship.

Antibiotics have become a major point of interest in the livestock industry following the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s decision to enact Guidance for Industry #209 and #213, which will prohibit the use of medically important antibiotics for growth purposes in livestock and require increased collaboration between veterinarians and producers for the therapeutic use of medically important antibiotics.

The swine industry has made a long-held commitment to antibiotic stewardship, and pork producers across America have always prioritized the judicious use of antibiotics on their operations. The National Pork Board has significantly expanded upon their ongoing commitment to antibiotic stewardship by spending the last 18 months developing and implementing a new comprehensive education, research and communication strategy to help make this commitment to antibiotic stewardship known to all, and to work in collaboration with federal agencies, such as USDA, FDA and CDC, to look for ways for continual improvement of responsible antibiotic use.

“These new initiatives are not new commitments to antibiotic stewardship, that is something we have had for a number of years, they are instead commitments to being more transparent about the ways we use antibiotics,” said Dr. Pyrburn during the podcast. “We want to make sure we’re letting folks know that when we use antibiotics on the farm, we are using them judiciously and there are reasons that we are using them. We want to let everybody know how we make these decisions on the farm and how they’re done with scientific background.”

Learn more in this week’s AnimalAgCast:
AnimalAgCast with Dr. Dave Pyburn, National Pork Board