Deracin 50 Meal label puts chlortetracycline back in the center of livestock disease control
DailyMed’s updated label for Deracin 50 Meal describes a Type A medicated article built around chlortetracycline calcium, a tetracycline-class antimicrobial intended for incorporation into dry animal feed. The product is positioned for oral use in feed manufacturing rather than as a standalone treatment, and the label is explicit about how tightly the drug must be handled in order to deliver a predictable final concentration. One pound of the product is recommended to be diluted with four pounds of a feed ingredient to create a 5-pound working premix, then used to prepare a preblend for Type C feed.
The practical point is straightforward: the antimicrobial effect depends on feed uniformity. If the drug is not mixed evenly, animals may receive subtherapeutic exposure, which can weaken response and complicate control of infection. In a feed-based antibacterial product, the mixer is part of the dose.
The label assigns the product to a broad range of food and companion birds and livestock species, but each use is tied to a defined pathogen or syndrome and to bacteria susceptible to chlortetracycline. The spectrum includes respiratory disease, enteric infection, reproductive losses, and selected management-related syndromes where bacterial suppression can reduce clinical impact. The list is long, yet the underlying pharmacology is familiar: tetracyclines inhibit bacterial protein synthesis, giving the drug a role in suppressing susceptible organisms across multiple animal systems when delivered consistently through feed.
Species-specific dosing reflects different production pressures and disease patterns
Among cattle uses, the label names active infection of anaplasmosis caused by Anaplasma marginale in beef cattle over 700 pounds, with an indicated rate of 0.5 mg per pound of body weight per day. A similar claim applies to beef and non-lactating dairy cattle as an aid in control of active anaplasmosis, also at 0.5 to 2.0 mg per pound per day in free-choice feeds. The same product is labeled for calves, beef cattle, and non-lactating dairy cattle for bacterial enteritis caused by Escherichia coli and bacterial pneumonia caused by Pasteurella multocida, with a higher daily exposure and a 5-day feeding limit.
A separate cattle indication targets growing cattle over 400 pounds for reduction in the incidence of liver abscesses. Another covers beef cattle and dairy replacement heifers for control of bacterial pneumonia associated with shipping fever complex caused by Pasteurella species susceptible to chlortetracycline. Shipping fever is a stressful, multi-factorial event, and antimicrobial coverage is aimed at the bacterial component that often follows transport and commingling stress.
The swine claims are similarly disease-centered. The product is labeled for control of porcine proliferative enteropathies, or ileitis, caused by Lawsonia intracellularis, and for treatment of bacterial enteritis caused by Escherichia coli and Salmonella choleraesuis, as well as bacterial pneumonia caused by Pasteurella multocida. The label also includes reduction in the incidence of cervical lymphadenitis, or jowl abscesses, caused by Group E streptococci, along with control of leptospirosis in breeding swine caused by Leptospira pomona.
One sentence on the label carries the kind of operational significance that matters on a working farm: some uses are time-limited to 5 days, others to 14 or 21 days, and the product is not framed as open-ended therapy. Duration is part of the safety and efficacy strategy.
Poultry and psittacine uses carry clear warnings about disease spread and residue risk
In turkeys, the label covers complicating bacterial organisms associated with bluecomb, or transmissible enteritis and coronaviral enteritis, and also includes infectious synovitis caused by Mycoplasma synoviae, hexamitiasis caused by Hexamita meleagrides, and mortality reduction in turkey poults not over 4 weeks of age due to Salmonella typhimurium. In chickens, the indications extend to infectious synovitis, chronic respiratory disease, air sac infection, and mortality reduction due to Escherichia coli infections.
For ducks, the product is labeled for control and treatment of fowl cholera caused by Pasteurella multocida. The feeding instructions vary by age and severity, with a body-weight based range and a maximum 21-day course. In birds, the drug is used as a feed-based antimicrobial shield against outbreaks that can move rapidly through a flock when environmental pressure, stocking density, and pathogen load align.
The psittacine section is especially direct. Parrots, macaws, and cockatoos suspected or known to have psittacosis caused by Chlamydia psittaci may be treated with 10 mg per gram of feed continuously for 45 days, with each bird expected to consume medicated feed equal to one-fifth of its body weight daily. During treatment, the birds should be kept individually or in pairs in clean cages. The label also states that psittacosis, avian chlamydiosis, or ornithosis is a reportable communicable disease transmissible between wild and domestic birds, other animals, and humans.
That warning changes the frame from routine husbandry to zoonotic control.
Residue warnings define where this product cannot be used
The withdrawal and residue section is as important as the indication list. No withdrawal period is required when the product is used according to label, but the label also excludes several high-risk situations. It is not approved for female dairy cattle 20 months of age or older, including dry dairy cows, because use in those animals may leave drug residues in milk and in calves born to those cows. A withdrawal period has not been established for pre-ruminating calves, and the product should not be fed to calves intended for veal. Ducks or turkeys producing eggs for human consumption are also excluded.
Those restrictions are not administrative fine print. They define the margin between legal use and residue violation in the food chain. For a feed-grade antimicrobial, the chief safety issue is not only toxicity in the target animal, but also whether measurable residues can reach milk, meat, or eggs.
The label also specifies storage below 25°C, with excursions permitted to 40°C, and says opened bags should be tightly resealed. Pharmgate Animal Health is identified as the packager, with the product marketed under ANADA 200-510. The active ingredient listing identifies chlortetracycline calcium at 110 g per kilogram, equivalent to 50 grams of chlortetracycline hydrochloride per pound.
Feed formulation is the real control point for this antimicrobial
This update reads less like a conventional drug monograph than a blueprint for controlled delivery. The product is not meant for liquid medicated feeds, and the label repeatedly returns to mixing precision, preblending, and complete ration administration. In cattle top-dress use, the drug must be spread uniformly so all animals can eat at the same time. In free-choice systems, the formulation itself must be FDA approved and, when proprietary formulas are used, a medicated feed mill license is required.
The biological logic behind the label is simple enough. Chlortetracycline works only when enough drug reaches the animal to suppress susceptible bacteria consistently over the prescribed interval. In feed medicine, the line between control and underdosing is shaped by consumption behavior, ration design, and group management. Uneven intake can create uneven selection pressure, and selection pressure is exactly what veterinarians and producers try to avoid when they use antimicrobials in herd or flock settings.
This label update does not introduce a new molecule or a novel mechanism. It formalizes the conditions under which an established feed antimicrobial can be used across cattle, swine, poultry, ducks, and psittacine birds, while drawing a hard boundary around residue-sensitive production classes and zoonotic avian disease. The remaining questions are operational: how consistently the product is mixed on farms and in mills, and how reliably each species receives the intended dose without crossing the label’s food-safety restrictions.