Lameness is one of the most common and severe welfare problems in dairy cattle, causing chronic pain that impairs production, reproduction, and longevity across millions of animals.
Lame dairy cows experience chronic pain that affects every aspect of their daily life. Cows with high locomotion scores spend less time eating, competing less effectively at the feed fence. They lie down for longer in attempt to reduce pain, but often cannot rise and rest optimally in poorly designed cubicles. Lame cows reproduce less efficiently and are culled earlier. The welfare harm is compounded by the fact that lameness is almost entirely preventable: farms achieving below 5% lameness prevalence demonstrate that management, housing, and foot health programs can nearly eliminate this suffering.