ROLE OF VETERINARIANS IN PROVIDING RESIDUE-FREE ANIMAL FOOD

Veterinarians are not primarily concerned with the increase in production by treating the sick animals and poultry but their important job is to ensure quality (residue free) edible animal products such as milk, meat and eggs to the public. The implementations of WTO regulations demand that veterinarians working in food animal medicine should learn how to avoid drug/chemical residues in food animals and disseminate this information to the farmers to safeguard the health of general public. This issue is also of paramount importance for the veterinarians employed in pharmaceutical and regulatory sectors responsible for assessing the fate of drugs and chemicals that enter the human food chain via the edible products. It is also need of the day that environmentalists, toxicologists and non government organizations (NGO) should pay due attention towards this issue. This is necessary to conduct complete risk assessment, risk management, risk communication studies and implement certain legislative measures to safeguard the public health. This article discusses some important issues in this context such as hazards of drug/chemical residues, modes of chemical exposure, establishment of maximum residue levels (MRL), withdrawal times (WDT) and limitations in residue analysis