CALF_News_October_November_2020

8 CALF News • October | November 2020 • www.calfnews.net D octoring cattle usually isn’t a producer’s favorite chore. Weather, faulty equipment, ornery labor or cattle or both can ruin a day and bust a budget. There is more detailed management of drugs being used. And there are reams of recordkeeping required to satisfy the government, and most important, who’s buying your calves. Advancements in drug treatments and to prevent or manage bovine respiratory disease (BRD), bovine viral diarrhea (BVD) and other diseases have helped. Gratefully, there is plenty of expertise from animal health companies and public and private veterinary, nutrition and cattle handling specialists to ease the burden. Nonetheless, further challenges will come from more government restric- tions on drug use, even if cattle get sick. CALF News visited with three well- known beef cattle scientists to get their take on how animal health products have changed and whether those changes provide improvements over what ranches and feedyards saw 20 years ago or longer. Dan Thomson, DVM, is chairman of the Iowa State Univer- sity Department of Animal Science and longtime feedyard veterinarian. Joe Paschal, Ph.D., is a professor and Exten- sion livestock specialist for Texas A&M AgriLife Research. Ty Lawrence, Ph.D., is an animal science professor at West Texas A&M University and director of the Beef Carcass Research Center. These professionals discussed various changes in animal health treatment, including vaccination protocols and antibiotics in cattle. The use of antibiot- ics in cattle has faced complaints since the 1990s or before. Potential human resistance to antibiotics used in meat production has been the issue. The Vet- erinary Feed Directive (VFD), a federal regulation to prevent over-the-counter sale of many antibiotics, resulted after continued grievances from animal rights activists and others. All feed-grade medications used for disease prevention and therapy require veterinary oversight and an accompany- ing VFD documentation. Livestock owners working with properly licensed practicing veterinarians can acquire a VFD, which allows the purchase and proper use of feed-additive medications. Changes for the Better? According to the American Veterinary Medical Association, animals can receive antibiotics if there is a clear indication of their need. Perhaps the way vaccines, antibiotics and other drugs are used dif- fers more than actual drugs available for cattle health. “We have had about the same antibi- otics and vaccines for cattle for the last 20 years,” Thomson says.“We have great tools. Probably the biggest change has been doctoring cattle with dart guns in the pasture.” Paschal adds that better precondition- ing and more uniform use of vaccines have enhanced animal health.“I think more attention is being paid to prepar- ing cattle through vaccination programs, backgrounding, etc.,” he says. “Better sourcing of cattle has also helped minimize potential health issues. Not all cattle are prepared [to continue their production cycle], but those that are prepared see fewer health issues – and that’s good.” Lawrence says the treatment of BRD has benefited from better injectable anti- biotics.“The most notable change in the past 20 years has been the development of new, macrolide-class injectable antibiot- ics to provide the industry with new and more effective tools to treat BRD,” he says.“The new antibiotics have certainly reduced morbidity and mortality com- pared to the older generation products.” By Larry Stalcup Contributing Editor Have Changes in Cattle Drug Use Helped? Better Animal Health “In a feedlot, about 90 percent of the antibiotics used in beef production are to control of liver abscesses.” – Dan Thomson, DVM . Photo courtesy Iowa State University