Antimicrobial drug usage from birth to 180 days of age in Irish dairy calves and in suckler beef calves

Abstract

Concern about the use of antimicrobials in food producing animals is increasing. The study objectivewas to quantify antimicrobial drug usage in calves using antimicrobial treatment records from Irishsuckler beef and dairy farms. Antimicrobial treatment records for calves born between 1 July 2014and 30 June 2015 on 79 suckler beef and 44 dairy farms were analyzed. Calves were followed frombirth (day 0) until 6 months of age. According to standard farm protocol, calves exhibiting clinicalsigns of any disease were identified and antimicrobial treatment was administered. Farmersrecorded the following information for each treatment administered: calf identification, age attreatment, disease event, drug name, number of treatment days, and amount of drug administered.In total, 3,204 suckler beef calves and 5,358 dairy calves, representing 540,953 and 579,997 calf-days at risk, respectively, were included in the study. A total of 1,770 antimicrobial treatments wereadministered to suckler beef (n = 841) and dairy calves (n = 929) between birth and 6 months ofage. There was large variation in TI DDDvet and TI DCDvet by farm. This study provides new insightsinto the time periods and indications for which specific antimicrobial substances are used in Irishdairy and beef suckler calves