Antibiotics in Chilean Salmon Aquaculture
The indiscriminate use of antibiotics in Chile’s salmon aquaculture industry puts at risk the health of wildlife that inhabits areas surrounding the cages, as well as the human population consuming the fish.
The biggest concern regarding public health is the detectable amounts of quinolones, a family of antibiotics whose use in animals is not approved in other countries (including the United States, a major destination of Chile’s exported salmon), in order to preserve its efficacy in combating human diseases.
Oceana is working to convince the Chilean government to ban the use of quinolones in salmonaquaculture, which would satisfy the limitations on antibiotics use of the salmon industry’s important market in the US.
