Pigs experience significant pain from routine husbandry procedures and disease. Advances in pig pain science are improving both recognition tools and treatment protocols across the industry.
Pig pain science has produced both compelling evidence of pain during routine procedures and practical tools for reducing it. The piglet grimace scale research demonstrated that castration and tail docking without analgesia cause acute and prolonged pain responses. The good news is that effective pain relief is available and affordable - meloxicam provides significant pain reduction when used perioperatively. The welfare challenge is adoption: despite evidence and some regulatory requirements, consistent pain relief use for routine procedures remains below what the evidence justifies. Progress is being made, particularly in markets where welfare-focused supply chains require documentation of pain management protocols.