Cattle Pain Management: The Undertreatment of Farm Animal Pain

Pain management in cattle has historically lagged far behind companion animal medicine. Improving recognition and treatment of cattle pain is one of the highest-impact welfare improvements available in livestock farming.

Key Facts

Common painful procedures in cattle include castration, dehorning/disbudding, branding, ear tagging, foot trimming, and difficult parturition — many of which are routinely performed without analgesia
Non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) including meloxicam and ketoprofen are approved for cattle use in the EU and UK and are effective at reducing pain indicators from surgical and husbandry procedures
Studies using validated pain scales (Cattle Composite Pain Scale, facial action coding) demonstrate that cattle undergoing dehorning without anaesthesia show sustained pain responses lasting hours to days post-procedure
Local anaesthesia (lidocaine nerve blocks for dehorning, intratesticular or ring block for castration) provides effective acute pain prevention and is increasingly required by legislation
Lameness — which affects 25–30% of dairy cows in many herds — is a major source of chronic pain that is frequently undertreated with analgesia due to cost and practical constraints
Research shows that cattle given analgesia after painful procedures return to normal feeding behaviour faster, show better growth rates, and have improved immune function compared to untreated controls
Stockperson attitudes toward cattle pain are a major barrier to analgesia use: surveys show that many producers underestimate the pain cattle experience from routine procedures

Welfare Considerations

Cattle pain management represents one of the clearest evidence-to-practice gaps in animal welfare. The science is unambiguous: cattle experience significant, prolonged pain from common husbandry procedures, and effective analgesic tools exist to prevent or reduce this pain. Yet adoption of routine analgesia in cattle practice lags behind companion animal medicine by decades. The barriers are multiple: cost (NSAIDs for cattle are inexpensive but represent an additional input cost), veterinary attendance requirements for some drugs, stockperson attitudes that normalise cattle pain, and the absence of mandatory requirements in many regulatory frameworks. The business case for analgesia is increasingly supported by evidence: faster recovery of normal behaviour, better growth, and improved immune competence following painful procedures represent economic benefits that can offset medication costs. Mandatory analgesia requirements for the most painful procedures — increasingly enacted across EU member states — provide the regulatory impetus where commercial incentives are insufficient.

What You Can Do

If you work with cattle, discuss routine analgesia protocols for all painful procedures with your herd veterinarian and implement them systematically
Choose beef and dairy products from certification schemes that require pain management for husbandry procedures including disbudding, castration, and lameness treatment
Support legislative requirements for mandatory analgesia for all painful cattle procedures, removing age exemptions and optional guidance
Advocate for veterinary training programmes that teach cattle pain recognition and management with the same rigour as companion animal pain medicine
Support research into practical, cost-effective cattle pain management protocols accessible to small-scale and low-income producers globally