Farmed Animals

Antibiotic Use in Farming and Animal Welfare

Routine antibiotic use in animal farming raises antimicrobial resistance risks while often masking welfare problems rather than solving them.

Key Facts

Agriculture accounts for over 70% of global antibiotic consumption
Prophylactic antibiotics are often used to compensate for poor husbandry conditions
Antibiotic resistance threatens both human and animal health globally
Higher-welfare systems typically require fewer antibiotics due to lower disease burden

Welfare Considerations

Using antibiotics to allow animals to survive conditions they could not otherwise tolerate masks suffering rather than eliminating it. Diseased animals treated late in clinical progression experience significant pain before treatment. Reducing disease pressure through better husbandry is both a welfare and a public health improvement.

What You Can Do

Choose meat and dairy products from farms with low antibiotic use certifications
Support legislation to ban preventive antibiotic use in healthy animals
Advocate for robust monitoring and publication of antibiotic use by species
Reduce meat consumption to decrease overall demand for antibiotic-intensive production