[gumby]

> [banning use of antibiotics in animal feed] may very well be counterproductive if it leads to infected meat spreading further.

This isn't why they put antibiotics in the food; it's because animals that eat bulk antibiotics gain more weight over the short term than animals that don't. Probably by killing off all the gut bacteria (except the antibiotic resistant ones) that might compete for nutrients. The animals are grown quickly then killed.

If an animal is actually sick it's treated differently, or simply destroyed. Even farmers who don't use antibiotics to stimulate growth will treat their sick animals!

BTW the resistant gut bacteria we're talking about are the ones that get people sick like e coli.