Risk of ARV in chicken, pork divides scientists
What you need to know:
ARVs are specifically made to treat HIV-positive individuals with suppressed immunity but a senior official of the National Drug Authority (NDA) on Wednesday said they were aware as early as 20013 that the drugs, mostly procured using donor cash, were used instead to treat African Swine Fever in pigs and Newcastle Disease in poultry
Scientists are divided on the risk to humans of eating pork and chicken laced with traces of anti-retroviral (ARV) drugs following revelations that farmers have for a decade used the life-saving medicine to treat and fatten animals and birds.
ARVs are specifically made to treat HIV-positive individuals with suppressed immunity but a senior official of the National Drug Authority (NDA) on Wednesday said they were aware as early as 20013 that the drugs, mostly procured using donor cash, were used instead to treat African Swine Fever in pigs and Newcastle Disease in poultry.
Makerere University’s School of Pharmacy Lecturer, Dr Hussein Oria, who led a team of researchers whose findings confirmed traces of Aids drugs in pork and chicken meat sold in Wakiso and Kampala, yesterday said the abuses increase the risk of consumers eventually developing resistance to the drugs when they catch HIV and have to be put on medication.
Some scientists, however, counter-argued that such threat is low.
Dr Oria explained that when a drug enters the body of an animal or human being, it is broken down. “In drug metabolism [breakdown in the body], not all drugs are metabolised 100 percent. So, some remain unmetabolised,” Dr Oria said.
The breakdown of some ARVs, according to a 2020 report by Ritah Nakato of the Department of Pharmacology and Therapeutics, Makerere University College of Health Sciences, are slower in pigs than in humans.
“Given the prolonged half-life of all three drugs (Efavirenz, nevirapine and tenofovir), there is potential for significant residual amounts of any or all the three drugs in pork at slaughter as well as sale points,” the report reads.
Dr Oria on the other hand explained that since there is an amount of the drug that remains in the animal, consumption causes the risk of drug resistance. “If organisms (infectious agents) are exposed to very low levels of a drug, then it cannot do anything to destroy those organisms but it gives them time to develop mechanisms to dodge those drugs,” he added.
Despite NDA said in a statement on Thursday the quantities of ARVs used to fatten animals and fowls is negligible, Uganda Medical Association Secretary General, Dr Herbert Luswata, expressed concern the practices diverts drugs away from hospitals where people living with HIV/Aids need them.
“Generally, when drugs enter into the body, they are metabolised and the form of the drug changes. So, when in the body, the organs like the liver change the drugs into something different,” he said.
He added: “That is how a drug is able to treat diseases in humans and even in animals. After some time, it is removed from the body through urine, faeces or sweat. For chicken, it is through the droppings.”
NDA, the regulator of drugs in the country, yesterday moved to deflect blame for the reported misuse of ARVs by farmers, arguing that it was only responsible for ensuring safe and efficacious medicines for humans.
The drugs for livestock, the agency noted, was a mandate of the Ministry of Agriculture, Animal Industry and Fisheries.
Weight gain
A senior official of the ministry in an interview yesterday told this newspaper that farmers had resorted to feeding birds and pigs on ARVs to quicken their maturation and weight gain because prices of feeds on the market have dramatically risen, despite concerns of the quality of some.
UMA’s Luswata said that most drugs are eliminated from the body within 24 hours.
“The serious problem would only happen when you slaughter [and eat] the pig within 24 hours. The worry to humans consuming these animal products [when slaughtered after such period when the drugs have been removed from the body] should not be there. There is no danger to that,” he said.
The Uganda Aids Commission and researchers in the country have reported cases of resistance of HIV to ARVs, but they attributed this to poor adherence to medication.
Dr Klause Niyonsenga, a medical doctor at Kungu Medicals Hospital in Kampala, however, said poor adherence and direct exposure to sub-therapeutic ARV drug levels in animals and humans are major causes of acquired HIV drug resistance.
In yesterday’s interview, Dr Oria said more research is required to definitively pinpoint the impact of pork and chicken laced with Aids drug on human health.
