Progress in antibiotic stewardship in cattle farming protects both public health and animal welfare by reducing antibiotic dependency through improved disease prevention and welfare management.
Antibiotic stewardship and welfare are aligned goals: the highest use of antibiotics occurs in farms with poor welfare, because disease causes both suffering and antibiotic dependency. Improving welfare reduces the disease burden that drives antibiotic use. Critically, antibiotic stewardship must not come at the cost of withholding necessary treatment from suffering animals - the goal is reducing the need for antibiotics through prevention, not denying them when treatment is genuinely required.