Pain management for farmed pigs remains inadequate despite the availability of effective analgesics; closing the gap between pain science and farm practice is a critical welfare priority.
The gap between available pain management technology and farm practice represents one of the most addressable welfare failures in livestock farming. Effective, affordable analgesics exist for pigs; the barrier is adoption, not capability. Piglets undergoing castration without anaesthesia experience pain responses — vocalisation, cortisol elevation, behavioural changes — lasting hours. The procedure is performed millions of times annually across Europe and globally. Closing the analgesic gap requires regulatory mandates rather than voluntary guidance — evidence consistently shows that voluntary pain management adoption rates are low even when analgesics are cheap and available. Countries that have legislated pain relief for pig castration show near-complete compliance when requirements are clear.