There is no short-term solution to the widespread abuse of antibiotics by the mainland's food producers, according to experts from several related industries.
 
Farmers often feed livestock with spoiled restaurant leftovers and low-quality feed to cut costs. Fish, crabs and even sea cucumbers are raised in tight nets or cases in polluted waters. Such dirty environments lead to large-scale bacterial infection.
 
To keep their products healthy and cut down on losses, farmers often use heavy doses of antibiotics, which are easily available and cheap.
 
Zhou Jianhua, a researcher with the Harbin Veterinary Research Institute under the Ministry of Agriculture, said most farmers were not informed about the nature of antibiotics and the risk of overdose. Some even mistake antibiotics for nutritional additives to animal feed - the more the better, he said.
 
While large food processing companies had to employ professional vets to regulate the use of antibiotics on animals because they were often the target of government inspectors, most farmers and small livestock producers, who contributed a substantial amount of meat, eggs and fish to local food markets, had long been ignored by government inspection and monitoring systems due to the small scale of their businesses and scattered locations.
 
"The lack of inspection and lack of education resulted in today's situation," Zhou said.
 
He Li, marketing director with Beijing Huaan Magnech Bio-Tech, which specialises in food safety inspection technology and equipment, said repeated food safety scandals and incidents in recent years had deeply unnerved the public.
 
Some wealthy people had bought the company's quick inspection equipment to test for antibiotics and other harmful chemicals in food bought from markets. "Our sales more than doubled in a year," she said. "The market demand is crazy."
 
But the biggest buyers were food production companies and government food safety agencies, He said.
 
"They are extremely eager to tighten up inspections. Their attitude has changed dramatically in the last couple of years, because they feel enormous pressure after so much bad news on food safety."
 
But He worried that some companies might still bet their luck on an antibiotics overdose.