Animal Welfare and Public Health

Animal welfare and public health are interconnected through zoonotic disease risk, antimicrobial resistance, and the broader concept of One Health that links human, animal, and environmental health.

Key Facts

Approximately 60% of human infectious diseases have animal origins
Intensive animal production creates conditions favouring pathogen evolution and transmission
Antimicrobial resistance is driven partly by livestock antibiotic use
The One Health framework is endorsed by WHO, OIE, and FAO as the appropriate approach to pandemic prevention
COVID-19, avian influenza, and SARS all originated from human-animal interfaces

Welfare Considerations

The connection between animal welfare and public health is increasingly recognised in the One Health framework. High-density, low-welfare production systems create conditions that facilitate pathogen emergence and evolution — the same crowding, stress, and immune suppression that harm animal welfare also create epidemiological conditions for disease amplification. Improving livestock welfare through lower stocking densities, better housing, and reduced stress has direct animal welfare benefits and simultaneously reduces the conditions in which pandemic pathogens emerge. The public health case for welfare improvement reinforces the ethical case, creating aligned incentives for systemic change in food production.

What You Can Do

Support One Health approaches to food policy that link animal welfare and pandemic prevention
Advocate for livestock welfare improvements that also reduce pandemic risk
Follow WHO and WOAH One Health publications on animal-human disease interfaces
Choose food from lower-density, higher-welfare production systems that reduce disease risk