The relationship between antimicrobial use and herd level mortality as a welfare indicator in veal calves
Year: 2018
Type: conference-paper
Abstract: The veal calf industry urgently needs to reduce antimicrobial use (AMU).A huge challenge, since this industry holds major risk factors for disease (e.g.young age, commingling, transport stress).As a result, fear is that a rapid decrease would increase mortality and therefore hamper animal welfare.This study explored the relationship between AMU and mortality in two major veal calf companies (integrations).Total AMU and different classes, including critically import antibiotics, were added to the model.The secondary objective was to determine risk factors for mortality.A retrospective cohort study was performed on electronically collected antimicrobial consumption and mortality data from the largest Belgian veal practice in the period 2014-2016.A mixed linear model was built to identify factors associated with mortality.The data consisted of 76 production cycles from 29 different farms managed by two integrations (1 and 2), covering 45.001 dairy veal calves.Average AMU was 30.1 defined daily doses for animals per year (DDDvet/year, Standard deviation (±) 10.4),
Authors: Jade Bokma, Randy Boone, Piet Deprez, Bart Pardon
Language: English
Subfield: Infectious Diseases
Field: Medicine
Domain: Health Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W2911668398