Taxing antibiotics against resistance

The World Health Organization classifies antibiotic resistance as a global health problem with serious consequences for the global economy. What primarily drives the development of resistance is the overuse of antibiotics, in both human and veterinary medicine.

There are large differences, both within the EU and between the EU and other countries, in the amount of antibiotics used in animal production. The statistics are somewhat incomplete, but according to Agri-Food Working Paper 2024:1 Today, for example, nearly three times as many antibiotics are used to treat pigs in the rest of the world as within the European Union.

Move the problem

Can the use of antibiotics in animal production be reduced by imposing an additional tax on their preparations? No, not directly. The researchers’ simulations show that a tax on antibiotics:

• Livestock production is declining marginally in most EU countries but increasing in the rest of the world.
• It reduces antibiotic use in the EU but increases it by almost the same amount in other countries. This is because low EU livestock production is replaced by production outside the EU.
• It does not reduce the global development of resistance but can fund the development of new antibiotics.

The Centre for Agri-Food Economics is a collaboration between SLU and the School of Economics, Lund University.

The article was published on Monday, August 12, 2024.

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