WITHDRAWAL TIME OF ANTIBIOTIC ENROFLOXACINE FOR SAFE MEDICATION USE IN CATFISH FARMING  

Nowadays catfish farming has well developed and its demand especially the consumption size has increased year by year. The problem in catfish farming that many farmers have to face is high mortality because of bacterial infections. Most of the bacterial infections are treated with antibiotic. However, because of quality assurance and food safety issue, antibiotic uses in fish farming require a serious attention. The determination of Maximum Residue Limit (MRL) of quinolone group in aquaculture is very important to minimize antibiotic residue exposure from food product to human. It also may monitor antibiotic residue in fish product. Withdrawal time is the time during antibiotic administration until the excretion of antibiotic metabolite from the fish.

Antibiotic enrofloxacine was applied by feed (oral administration) with dose 1gr/20kg fish body weight. The antibiotic was applied for 5 days. This study use 150 fish in each 2 ton fiber tub with size 50-100 gr for each fish. The fish divide in two group, viz. control group and treatment group 3 repetition. Fish sampling was conducted from day 0 (3 hour after fed the medication feed on last day of treatment), 1, 3, 6, and 12. Then the samples were tested by ELISA for enrofloxacine residue. The calculation of withdrawal time in this study is using analysis regression logarithm on upper value and 95% level of confidence.  After 5 days of treatment, the study shows that withdrawal time of enrofloxacine in muscle reach below 0.5 MRL (50 ppb) during the treatment period (4 days before the treatment end). According to this result, the use of enrofloxacine is safe for catfish farming.