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Abstract :

Because of the growing threat from antimicrobial resistance, a number of international, European and national initiatives have been developed to mitigate the risk arising from antimicrobial use in animals. However, these initiatives are facing challenges and information gaps, especially related to how to quantify, explain and reduce antimicrobial use in food-producing animals.
The objective of this PhD thesis was to address some of these challenges, focusing on the pig sector and the herd level, and exploring more specifically i) what are the most suitable indicators that should be selected to quantify antimicrobial use, ii) what is the relative importance of selected technical and psychosocial drivers for antimicrobial use in pig production, iii) what is the profile of pig farms that manage to combine high technical performance and low antimicrobial usage and iv) what is the technical and economic impact of the implementation of alternative measures to reduce antimicrobial use in pig production.
This work contributed to provide a basis for effective, evidence-based yet affordable strategies to mitigate the public health burden of antimicrobial resistance.

Key words :

Antimicrobial use, Antibiotic, Antimicrobial stewardship, Drivers, Intervention study