Pittsburgh City Council is among the first in the country to pass a resolution calling for federal legislation to rein in antibiotics use on factory farms.

On Tuesday, council adopted the resolution, which “supports a statewide and national ban on nontherapeutic uses of antibiotics in livestock production.”

As detailed in CP in February, nationally based group Food & Water Watch had asked council to approve the measure as part of its campaign to pass the Protection of Antibiotics for Medical Treatment Act (PAMTA) and the Prevention of Antibiotic Resistance Act (PARA), in the U.S. House and Senate, respectively. The resolution says Council “will send letters to our Congressional Representatives and U.S. Senators” urging them to co-sponsor the bills.

In particular, the group is targeting U.S. Sen. Bob Casey, who sits on the Senate Agriculture Committee.

Bans on nontherapeutic uses of antibiotics on cattle, pigs and chicken, for instance, are controversial, though much of the opposition seems to originate in the pharmaceutical industry. Similar bans in European countries, including the Netherlands, are generally regarded as successful.

“We applaud Pittsburgh, PA for passing one of the first city-council resolutions in the country, calling on federal legislators rein in the rampant use of antibiotics on factory farms,” Food & Water Watch volunteer Nicole Kubiczki, a Pittsburgh resident, said in a press release.

“Factory farms feed low doses of antibiotics to livestock to promote unnatural growth and compensate for filthy, crowded living conditions,” said Kubiczki. “As a result, we’re entering an age in which these life-saving medicines are no longer working to treat infections in humans. We need to change course in our handling of antibiotics in this country, and Pittsburgh took action to stand in support of public health this morning.”