The Dangers of Using Animal Medications: A Case Study on the Accidental Injection of Cow Antibiotics in Humans

There are a lot of people who have this believe that they can take medications and injections meant for animals and not suffer any effect. This isn't true, and a lot of people do not know that while these drugs are good for animals, they might be completely bad for humans.

Today's post is a case of a man who accidentally injected himself with cow antibiotics. This post is based on a case published by the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health on the 18th of October, 2003.

The farmer wanted to administer antibiotics to his calf to prevent Dairy Calf Pneumonia which and expensive and difficult cow condition. After preparing the antibiotics, and approached the heifer, another cow that noticed him walking towards the calf and rammed into him with force. He fell to the ground and felt dizzy. He tried to stand but couldn't, and noticed that the syringe of the injection was bent, and the content was empty. He felt a burning sensation in his body, and he realized that he had accidentally injected himself with the syringe and the force and allowed the entire antibiotics to be emptied into his veins.

He had dark vision as he tried to walk and collapsed. He was rushed to the hospital, along with the bent injection. At examination, the patient presented with Tachycardia (Tachy which means fast) and Cardia (meaning Heart). This means that he had a fast heart rate but his blood pressure was low. Also, his heart rhythm was erratic, and this are symptoms that needed to be handled but then, the cause also needed to be understood. The man was about to inject Tilmicosin into the cow, and let's remember that different antibiotics perform different functions regardless of if it is for humans, or bovine.

Antibiotics can be classified into Beta-Lactam (which alters the cell wall of bacteria and the synthensis of the cell wall with example being penicillin), Sulfonamides (Inhibits the incorporation of PABA into folic acid, with an example being Sulfanalamide), Aminoglycosides (which inhibits protein synthesis by binding to a site of the 16s ribosomal RNA of the 30s Ribosome, and an example is Gentamicin), Tetracyclines (Inhibits the initiation of translation by binding to the 30s ribosomal subunit, with example being Minocycline), Macrolides (inhibits protein synthesis by binding to 50s ribosomal subunits, with example being Azithromycin), Quinolones (inhibits DNA synthesis by stabilizing DNA strand breaks created by DNA gyrase and toposomerase IV, with an example being Ciprofloxacin), and Oxazolidinone (Inhibits protein synthesis by binding bacterial 23s ribosomal RNA of the 50s subunit). ^,

Tilmicosin is a Macrolide that stops the internal machinery of bacteria preventing it from producing the structures it needs to function. The human version of Macrolides is erythromycin which is an oitment for eye infection, and Azithromycin for pneumonia. Macrolides have side effects that can affect the heart but when administered to humans, its dose has been certified so that its benefit would be extremely possible over its side effect but with Tilmicosin, humans weren't considered. It was meant for animals, also the dose which got into him was an animal dose and not a one that humans should take at all.

With this, it was evident that the electrical process of getting the heard to be was very fast causing the patient's tachycardia but also the process was falling out of sync which was why his heart rhythm was erratic but his blood pressure was low which means that the Tilmicosin blocked the calcium channels in the heart muscles preventing the ability to pump blood properly. This is the opposite of what a toxic dose of macrolides would exert its effect which wold block potassium from going into the heart muscle.

Tilmicosin toxicity hasn't been seen to have any antidote but giving calcium would be the possible next step. Possibly, a medication to help open calcium gates in the heart would be another option but this wasn't possible because the patient collapsed and died.

The difficulty with toxicity and poison antidotes is that people cannot begin to poison humans to find out what antidotes should be used on them. I bet you thought of using animal experiments, but animals are not humans just as you saw in this post. Also, a lot of people do not published result they get from treating people with toxins or poisons, also those who published because of a first time success might be biased. If they aren't there is very little chance that it might not go the same way the next time such a thing occur again.

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Image Reference
Image 1 || Freerangestock.com || Inspection of cattle

Image 2 || Rawpixel.com || Hospital Corpsman 3rd Class