2.3 Antibiotics and animal welfare

Can you imagine what it would be like if we couldn’t treat animals with antimicrobials?

While good husbandry, hygiene, and biosecurity are critical for protecting animal health and welfare on farms, sometimes animals become sick and require antimicrobials. Veterinarians must be able to access antimicrobials to treat sick animals.

Good husbandry and welfare mean providing clean and comfortable housing, nutritious feed, clean drinking water and good air quality. These elements form the basis for keeping animals healthy, so they are more able to resist diseases. However, in many LMICs the lack of nutritious feed and clean drinking water and the sharing of common grazing areas makes livestock susceptible to disease. For many farmers, animal welfare concerns come from scarce feed and health resources rather than an absence of care.

Adopting innovative approaches to reduce long-term use of antimicrobials in food animals is likely to be more beneficial than banning medically important antimicrobials as recommended by the WHO (WHO, 2017b). Actions can include efforts to eliminate significant diseases, increase the use of vaccines, improve farming practices, and adopting AMS programmes at the local level.