Livestock Antibiotics and Welfare: Responsible Use

Antibiotic use in livestock has welfare and public health dimensions. Reducing unnecessary use requires addressing the underlying welfare problems that drive disease.

Key Facts

Approximately 70% of global antibiotic use is in livestock production
Routine prophylactic use of antibiotics masks poor welfare conditions rather than improving them
Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) is a growing global health crisis partly driven by livestock antibiotic use
The EU banned routine prophylactic antibiotic use in livestock in 2022
Animals in higher welfare systems with better space, enrichment, and nutrition have lower disease rates
Responsible antibiotic stewardship involves treating sick animals while improving conditions to reduce disease incidence

Welfare Considerations

The link between antibiotic use and welfare is bidirectional: poor welfare conditions create disease pressure that drives antibiotic use, and antibiotic overuse masks these conditions by suppressing disease without addressing root causes. Animals in overcrowded, barren, or nutritionally stressed systems are more vulnerable to infection and require more antibiotic interventions. Improving welfare — through space, enrichment, good nutrition, and lower stocking densities — reduces disease incidence and therefore antibiotic need. This creates a positive alignment between welfare improvement and antibiotic stewardship: addressing one advances the other.

What You Can Do

Choose meat from farms with documented antibiotic stewardship and low AMR programmes
Support the UK Responsible Use of Medicines in Agriculture (RUMA) Alliance and equivalent bodies
Advocate for EU-style bans on routine prophylactic antibiotic use in livestock globally
Reduce meat consumption to decrease aggregate demand for intensively reared antibiotic-dependent production
Support research into vaccines and non-antibiotic disease management tools for farmed animals