NZ must develop new methods with animal drugs

Media release

25 May 2007

NZ must develop new methods of delivering current animal drugs

If New Zealand is to maintain its position as an international leader in animal welfare and animal exports it must develop new methods of delivering current animal analgesia (pain relief drugs).

This is the call from Dr Craig Johnson, a senior lecturer in veterinary neurophysiology at Massey University, who is speaking at the NZVA Large Animal conference in Palmerston North today.

Dr Johnson said the future of the animal food industry as a whole lies, not with developing new drugs and molecules but, in developing new and cost effective ways of using existing drugs and molecules.

Because of the size of the global food animal health market, it is often not viable for an international pharmaceutical company to develop and launch this type of drug.

According to Dr Johnson, the reason this is so significant to New Zealand’s animal food industry is because of the added value to our export market from the ‘clean, green welfare friendly’ image we portray.

“Public expectation of humane treatment of farm animals is increasingly high. However, because of the cost involved in launching new drugs[1], it is more economical to focus on new ways of delivering the drugs we already have,” said Dr Johnson.

“For example, if we were able to incorporate a vaccine that an animal will already have, with analgesia it would drastically cut the cost of the drugs and the time involved delivering the analgesia to the animal.”

Dr Johnson said the New Zealand agricultural industry can not afford to slip behind in the care of animals.

“But at the same time we must keep the production of safe food products as cheap as possible.

“In order to maintain this balancing act and move to the next step it is critical we continue to focus on easier delivery and equal efficacy of drugs at an affordable cost.”

Ends

© Scoop Media