Volume 130, 1 August 2016, Pages 41–50
Abstract
Data
on sales of antimicrobials using a standardised methodology have shown
that there are vast differences between countries in amounts of
antimicrobials sold for food-producing animals, but these data do not
provide insight on how sales are distributed by species and age groups.
The aim of this study was to compare herd level antimicrobial usage for
pigs by age category, antimicrobial class and administration route for
farrow-to-finish herds in four EU countries. A cross-sectional study was
conducted among 227 farrow-to-finish pig herds with at least 100 sows
and 500 finishing pigs in Belgium (n = 47), France (n = 60), Germany (n = 60) and Sweden (n = 60).
Detailed information about the antimicrobial consumption for breeding
and growing pigs was collected. Antimicrobial usage was quantified as
active substance expressed as mg and then converted to treatment
incidence (TI) based on Defined Daily Doses Animal per 1000 pig-days at
risk. TIs varied between and within countries, herds and age groups. The
Swedish herds had the lowest and the German herds the highest overall
use. Most treatments were applied to weaned piglets except in the
Swedish herds where treatments of suckling piglets were most frequent.
Antimicrobials were most often applied through feed or water except in
the Swedish herds where parenteral treatments were most frequent.
Aminopenicillins was the antimicrobial class most commonly used. Use of
third and fourth generation cephalosporins constituted 11% of use for
the Belgian herds, which was higher compared to the other countries.
There was a significant (p < 0.01) association between the
within‐herd antimicrobial use across different age categories. This
study has shown that there were large differences in antimicrobial use
for pigs between countries, herds and age groups in farrow-to-finish
herds of similar size when actual consumption data were compared.
Collecting detailed usage data can be used to efficiently target high
users in order to reduce antimicrobial consumption.
Keywords
- Pig;
- Antimicrobial consumption;
- Use;
- Treatment incidence;
- Antibiotic
© 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
