Immunocontraception using vaccines like PZP provides a humane alternative to lethal culling for managing overabundant wildlife populations including deer, horses, and elephants.
Contraception-based wildlife management avoids the welfare costs of lethal control — the fear and suffering of individual animals during culling — while achieving the same population reduction goals. Unlike culling, contraception maintains family and social group structures, preserving the welfare benefits of social bonding for surviving animals. Immunocontraception represents a welfare improvement in almost every context where lethal management alternatives are compared.