Animal disease outbreaks in the EU are not natural disasters, and mass culling is not solving them. That was the message at a European Parliament event on 1 July, hosted by MEP Tilly Metz (Greens/EFA) and MEP Paulo do Nascimento Cabral (EPP), and co-organised by Animal Advocacy & Food Transition and FVE – Federation of Veterinarians of Europe, a week before the Commission published its EU Livestock Strategy and on the day Ireland took up the Presidency of the Council of the EU. Speakers argued the pattern will keep repeating until Europe changes the food system that produces it, from farming practices to the trade rules that shape the response once disease strikes.
Since October 2020, more than 120 million birds have been culled across Europe due to HPAI, said co-host Tilly Metz, including around 50 million in the 2021-2022 season alone. In Greece, MEP Sakis Arnaoutoglou (S&D) said over 2,000 outbreaks of sheep and goat pox had forced the culling of almost half a million animals: “There is a family losing income, a rural community becoming weaker, and local production chain being disrupted.”
Metz argued these outbreaks are the predictable result of a food system built on overcrowding: “We present depopulation as a technical necessity, yet we rarely speak honestly about what it really means for the animals that are involved.” Valerie Jonckheer-Sheehy, an Irish veterinarian and EBVS European Veterinary Specialist in Animal Welfare Science, Ethics and Law, made the legal case: “European law recognises that animals are sentient. That’s Article 13 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union. And yet, when disease strikes, our law makes killing the first response, and treats the alternatives as an exception the authorities may choose, rather than a path they must take. I am asking you to turn that around. The killing of healthy animals should be a genuine last resort, written into our laws, not left to discretion.” She pointed to trade rules, not science, as the reason vaccinated healthy animals still get culled.
Jonathan Rushton, Professor of Economics of Animal Health at the Roslin Institute, University of Edinburgh, who leads the Global Burden of Animal Diseases (GBADs) programme, made the case for treating this as a data and measurement problem, not just a welfare one. He pointed out that animal health sits at the foundation of a European food sector worth an estimated €1.3 trillion, affecting the daily wellbeing of 450 million consumers, yet the sector still lacks the kind of systematic health data that would let policymakers see clearly what disease outbreaks, and the response to them, actually cost. Rushton’s team is building a way to track animal health losses the way human health systems already track disease burden over time, capturing not just lost productivity but welfare outcomes too, drawing on examples like Ireland’s BVD control programme, which cut disease impact while also reducing mortality and improving growth rates. “Many of our reactions are focused in terms of trying to get rid of the host, not the pathogen,” he said. “It pays to be informed.”
From the field: Greek cattle farmer Yiannis Paradas pointed to vaccination as the only long-term fix. Veterinarian Julien Le Tual, who managed France’s 2025-2026 Lumpy Skin Disease outbreak, said: “The goal is not to normalise mass culling. The goal is to make rapid eradication less dependent on it.” Veterinarian Gloria Hylviu, describing Peste des Petits Ruminants in Albania: “Behind every culled animal there is a farmer, a veterinarian and a community trying to recover.”
On policy, Rob Doyle from the Irish Department of Agriculture opened the Irish Presidency by naming welfare, farmer stress and veterinary workload as direct costs of outbreaks. Francisco Reviriego-Gordejo, from the Commission’s DG SANTE, set out its shift towards prevention. Siegfried Moder, FVE President, was blunt: “It’s not because the legislation wants this. It’s because the trade doesn’t want to use this meat.” Alain Cantaloube of FESASS, flagged animal movement safety and EU funding as the most urgent gaps.
Our Director, Olga Kikou, brought it back to root causes: “We cull, we move on, and then it happens again. Crisis, cull, crisis again. We keep spinning because we’re not addressing what drives it: overcrowded facilities, intensive stocking densities, vast numbers of animals in poor conditions, transport and mixing of animals. You don’t break out of it by culling faster. You break it by stepping out of it, fewer animals in better conditions.” Closing the event, co-host Paulo do Nascimento Cabral said the cost of preventing disease “will always be significantly lower than the cost of managing epidemics,” adding: “Animal health is everyone’s health.”
With the EU Livestock Strategy now published, AAFT and FVE are calling on the Commission and the Irish Presidency to make the killing of healthy animals a genuine last resort written into law, not a default left to discretion.
Read the full report, “The True Cost of Animal Disease” here
