Technical Article
AGPs out, Inflammation in
AGPs out, Inflammation in
In livestock production, antibiotics were widely used as growth promoters (AGPs). The reason AGPs have been used to promote growth is simple. Antibiotics at sub-therapeutic levels reduce pathogen pressure, inflammation and diseases. Once the body no longer needs to waste energy mounting an immune response to pathogens and trying to fight infections, all the metabolic energy the animals acquire from nutrients is primarily channeled for growth. However, since AGPs have been increasingly banned around the world, due to the rise of antimicrobial resistance, certain challenges in animal rearing started re-surfacing. Inflammation, for example, has become a critical and visible issue in many farms. And one of the main causes of inflammation is oxidative stress.
What is oxidative stress?
Oxidative stress is a process in the body that can happen in every cell or tissue, impairing absorption capacity and leading to lipid peroxidation, protein nitration and DNA damage. This process occurs when there is an imbalance between free radicals and antioxidants.
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