Mr. Conor Geraghty:

I will deal with it. I would not agree with Senator Daly's interpretation that our present submission has been about market share or has not been about resistance. Certainly, we would never get into an "us and them" situation. As a veterinary representative organisation, we sit on all the stakeholder groups in the country, from the Animal Health Ireland ones to the antiparasitic resistance stakeholder group, and we have never been found wanting in putting our shoulder to the wheel to push for change and consensus within those groups. Anyone who sits on those groups will concur with that.

Second, with regard to the difference between prescription-only medicines and a licensed merchant product, a product is labelled LM, for licensed merchant, or POM, for prescription-only medicine. One cannot advertise, discount, offer on sale or use as a promotional product any product that is POM. If anyone picks up the pages of the Irish Farmers’ Journal, the Farming Independentor whatever other newspaper they read as a farmer, they will not see advertisements for POM products on the page because that is illegal. These are to be used prudently and not to be advertised to encourage people to use them. That is one of the key differences between antiparasitic products that are POM or non-POM.

Third, with regard to antimicrobials, the Senator is correct that antimicrobial resistance is a growing problem. This was highlighted by the man who invented antimicrobials, Mr. Fleming, in that, when he got the Nobel prize for the discovery of penicillin, he said that as soon as it is used, resistance will develop. The more any of these products are used, the more resistance will develop.

The other problem with resistance in antimicrobials is that this resistance is not alone in an individual animal or human, it is also in the environment, and bacteria with the resistance gene can infect other bacteria. Where, for example, waste is coming into the environment from hospitals, that can make its way into agriculture and, vice versa, where resistance is developing in agriculture, it will find its way to humans.

Prescription-only medicines are not going to limit resistance. We have to change the way we use these products. For the past 20 years, we have seen this both in human and veterinary medicine. There have been huge advertising campaigns over the past two decades with regard to human medicines to tell people that if they have flu, they do not need an antibiotic, and these campaigns have been quite public.

Over the same period, as Senator Lombard pointed out, the amount of vaccine or preventative medicine being used by farmers in this country, which was driven by the veterinary profession given these herd health plans were driven by vets, has increased by over 200%. If we look back at our usage of antimicrobials from 2010 to now, it was quite steady as an industry all during that period until the last report, which showed it has reduced. During that time, we have had a massive increase in our national herd, for example, and we have gone through dairy expansion. Despite an ever-increasing pressure on the system, therefore, we have managed to, at worst, keep it steady and, recently, make gains and reduce it. I know some looking at the previous figures would like to see a bigger reduction but the fact we have increased vaccination rates, engaged with farmers on herd health and maintained the steady or declining use of antimicrobials is testament to the efforts of veterinary practitioners and farmers in the country working together, which is what we do, to help reduce animal disease.

To reiterate the point on anthelmintic resistance, it is not about an "us and them". To address something that was missed on Deputy Carthy's question about Zolvix, the reason Zolvix was not used is because it was treated by the veterinary profession as a precious resource only to be used as a last resort, where it was needed for that tiny percentage of farms that could not use anything else. Given the fact we were not using enough, the company did not find it viable to keep selling it and we perhaps have supply issues as a result. It is typical of how serious the veterinary profession was about this last anthelmintic dose that it was only to be used where there was nothing else to use. That is why it was not used in huge quantities. It was preserved so we would not have resistance to that as well.