Feeding Livestock Antibiotics May Worsen Climate Change

Farmers have already been asked to stop feeding so many antibiotics to their livestock

A link may have been discovered between antibiotics fed to livestock and global warming, according to a study published this week, NBC News reported. 

Researchers from the University of Colorado at Boulder helped conduct the study, and fed antibiotics to 10 cows in Finland.

According to the study, the manure from cattle fed a common antibiotic produced even more methane than normal. The antibiotics kill off bacteria that compete with methane-producing microbes, the researchers reported in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B. 

"We know that there are negative consequences of antibiotics, particularly this effect of antibiotic resistance," said researcher Tobin Hammer. "But this was a pretty unexpected link between antibiotics and this other important environmental issue that we care about — greenhouse gases."

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