As I understand it, this ban was on routine dosing of particular antibiotics only.  It was not a blanket ban on all antibiotics administered for any purpose.  So it was not a "one size fits all."  

True enough, Madame.  The farmers I know have their farms on verdant Blue Ridge hillsides eating their own homegrown grass and hay--but did have to use some antibiotics.

They also had a horrible time turning a profit --most had other jobs.

This is my point.  It seems like there would be a reasonable use of antibiotics, and an outright ban would be counterproductive, and unduly burdensome regulation on folks like those I know. 

Ill-considered regulation makes profit possible only on greater scales than the family farm, which is a reason why small dairy and beef cattle farms are in such serious decline here in the US, and actually then favors the ugly, smelly, awful corporate farms.

In fact, antibiotics are given as a routine part of feeding in factory farms.  Farmers do not wait for an outbreak of sickness before administering antibiotics.  So, yes, part of the issue IS that they are administered prophylactically. 

As for the term "factory farming:" I don't refer only to large corporate farms, but to any farm that uses "factory" practices: keeping too many animals confined in too small a space, feeding questionable feed including hormones, antibiotics, and animal offal.  Basically a factory farm is any farm that practices modern techniques designed to maximize profit at the expense of the health of not only their animals, but also potentially their customers.  So small farms can be factory farms too. 

IS the issue that the antibiotics are given as a prophylactic? Because, of course, anyone is free to buy hormone and anti-biotic free milk and meat, and a market has developed for such.

But, I would also guess that very few people would not take an antibiotic to rid themselves of a bacterial infection.  I would rather eat meat from a healthy animal than a diseased one.

For the small farmer, the costs of compliance to regulations are high.  I am not against all regulation of farming, certainly.  But, we do need to ensure the regulations are not one-size-fits all or ill-considered.

Again as you say Mr. Ape, a multitude of research has been done on this matter and it has been proven that not only is the 'nasty meat' contaminated by these antibiotics, but also the manure that they excrete is contaminated leading to the corruption of crops that are grown on this manure. This can lead to greater problems such as mass plant diseases that have grown stronger due to the antibiotics and of course this can lead not only to famine but to humans catching the disease.

To top all of this a lot of these crops are used in animal feed which just means that the antibiotics go round in circles and circles!!! So not only is the problem potentially ridiculously damaging but it is essentially very hard and very slow to stop.

I absolutely agree that farming subsidies paid to massive farming corporations is abhorrent. If you want to see appalling abuse of subsidies, look at the Europea Common Agricultural Policy, although I am not sure if it is worse than the US subsidy programs; I just know it is bad. There can be no such thing as fair trade with developing nations while farming subsidies remai in place.

I also don't want any antibiotics in the meat I eat, regardless of who I am bying meat from and how big the farm is.

Or rather healthier humans. Low level use of antibiotics in the US's food animals is associated with a rise in drug-resistant strains of salmonella. The World Health Organization has been raising the alarm about antibiotic overuse since 2000.