The Cambridge Pain Atlas for farm animals maps the scientific evidence for pain in cattle, pigs, sheep, poultry and fish, providing a foundation for improved pain management in veterinary practice.
The Pain Atlas represents a pivotal moment in farm animal welfare science - it systematically mapped what we know about pain in species that humans use at industrial scale. Its most important contribution is not adding new knowledge but synthesising existing evidence into a format that guides clinical practice. For each of 78 conditions, it answers: is there good evidence of pain? How severe is it? For how long does it persist? What does this mean for treatment? The gap between the evidence documented in the Atlas and current veterinary practice in many farm animal contexts remains wide, but the Atlas provides the foundation for closing it.