Decentring antibiotics: UK responses to the diseases of intensive pig production (ca. 1925-65)

Abigail Woods

doi:10.1057/s41599-019-0246-5

Abstract

It is widely assumed that the development of antibiotics had a transformative effect on livestock production by making it possible to keep larger numbers of animals in smaller spaces without them succumbing to disease. Using the health and production of UK pigs, ca. 1925-65, as a case study, this article argues that their impact has been overstated. It draws on evidence from veterinary journals, farming magazines, and government-appointed committees to demonstrate the significance of other methods of countering the diseases that emerged in association with intensive production systems. Devised by vets, farmers and other experts, these methods predated antibiotics and evolved alongside them. They were rooted in a shared understanding of pig diseases as highly complex phenomena that resulted from interactions between pig bodies and their environments. Recognition of the roles played by housing, husbandry, nutrition, and pathogens in the production of pig disease suggested multiple possible points of intervention. In situating antibiotics within this landscape of disease prevention and control, this article challenges existing claims about their reception and impact, decentres them from the history of intensive farming, and draws attention to other methods of promoting pig health, which may find renewed applications as we move towards a post-antibiotic era.

Highlights

Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) is currently regarded as one of the greatest threats to human health
It is often claimed that antibiotics made intensive farming possible, creating in the process new threats to human health and animal welfare (Bud, 2007; Kirchhelle, 2018a, 2018b)
The question of what diseases Minimal Disease’ (MD) pigs were free from remained unclear, and as Hinchliffe and Ward have shown (2014), this remains the case today. The former Advancement of Virus Pneumonia Free Pigs’ (AAVPFP) survived until 1993, but its ability to control Virus Pneumonia of Pigs (VPP) declined over time, as increases in herd size and stocking density resulted in greater volumes of airborne pathogens, which posed a growing threat to herds attempting to remain free of the disease (Goodwin, 2009; Meredith, 2009)

Summary

Introduction

Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) is currently regarded as one of the greatest threats to human health. Building on previous studies of mid-20th century pig production and veterinary care in the UK (Woods, 2012, 2013), Western Europe and North America (Jones, 2003; Finlay, 2004; Smith-Howard, 2010, 2017; Saraiva, 2016), this account departs from recent analyses of agricultural antibiotics by examining them from the perspective of historically situated concerns with animal health, rather than present-day concerns with human health It seeks to probe rather than presume the significance of antibiotics to the rise of intensive farming, and to insert farmers’ voices into a historical narrative that is currently dominated by scientists and policy makers. McGuckian (1956, p. 26) later reflected: ‘we had changed over from thinking in terms of ill-health and its prevention to the conception of health as a positive thing...the trouble is not in the inherent quality of pigs, but arises from our own incompetence.’

Section 2

Conclusion

Findings

Sept 2018