Castration of male livestock is routinely performed for management purposes, often without adequate pain control despite clear evidence of suffering.
Livestock castration causes well-documented acute and prolonged pain. The motivations for castration — meat quality, behavioral management, and social mixing — are real but in most cases do not require the degree of pain that unmanaged castration causes. Local anesthetic and NSAID analgesia dramatically reduce pain responses. Immunocastration using a vaccine provides an alternative that avoids surgical pain entirely for pigs. Regulatory mandates and retailer requirements for analgesia are the most effective drivers of change given that cost barriers to pain relief are low.