Hi, my name is Meghann Pierdon. I'm a veterinarian at the University of Pennsylvania School of Veterinary Medicine. And today I'm going to introduce you to the concept of animal welfare. So what is animal welfare? Animal welfare is an intuitive concept that's going to be biased by an individual's experiences. I would like to draw a distinction between animal welfare and animal welfare science. Animal welfare science is a methodology to make subjective opinion into objective fact. A good example to illustrate this concept of animal welfare is to look at two different dogs. Our first dog has an owner that had grown up in a very small family. They valued health, and safety, and orderly disciplined behavior. Now the dog of this owner received regular veterinary care, two meals of low-fat dog food every day, and was always walked on a leash. Now our second dog, their owner had grown up in a very large community that valued feasting, communal living, and the sharing of resources, and also close contact with the natural world. Now this dog, the owners' third as the first two had been killed by cars, had burrs in its coat, was fed generously but sporadically, and had never worn a collar in its life. We can ask the question, which dog has better welfare? And here we can see that animal welfare involves value notions as well as a sense of what is better or worse for that animal. Animal welfare refers to the actual state of an animal rather than to the ethical obligations people have to care for that animal. It also describes the quality of an animal's life as it is experienced by that individual animal, and is the state of that animal as regards its attempts to cope with its environment. When we apply this definition to our two dogs, we can see that a dog might thrive in one environment and have a very good quality of life, and may not thrive or have a good quality of life in the other environment. Both are equally possible. Animal welfare involves multiple facets. Physiological health, psychological health, hygiene, and comfort. Animal welfare is all about what the animal itself is experiencing. And in the end it's going to be a balance of science and values. Animal welfare is the state of well-being brought about by meeting the physical, environmental, nutritional, behavioral, social and psychological needs of the animal under the care and supervision of people. So why is animal welfare important? In the United States alone, there are over 2 billion chickens, there are millions of turkeys, cattle, pigs, ducks, sheep and goats. There are laboratory animals and owned pets. And this is to say nothing of all the rest of the animals in the world that are under human care. So let's look at some conceptions of animal welfare using this Venn diagram. Our first conception involves functioning. And in this conception, we can look at productivity and health. How well is an animal functioning? A lot of people that would hold to this concept of animal welfare would be veterinarians and producers. A good example of high functioning would be a dairy cow that's making a lot of milk. And a farmer might say, if my dairy cow is making a lot of milk, then my dairy cow must have good welfare. Another conception of animal welfare involves feelings. Is an animal able to have pleasurable feelings? Is an animal suffering? Often times the public focuses on this conception of animal welfare. A third conception of animal welfare would be natural behavior. Is an animal able to express species specific characteristics that are specific to that animal? Biologists and ethicists would often be in this sphere of animal welfare. Now animal welfare scientists would say that in the end for an animal to have good welfare, we have to look at all three of these concepts of animal welfare, and bring them together in order to see if an animal actually has good welfare. So where did we get welfare science? Most people trace the origins of welfare science back to Ruth Harrison's book, Animal Machines: The New Factory Farming Industry. Now Ruth Harrison was inspired by Rachel Carson, and she did investigative journalism looking at intensive poultry and livestock farming. There she saw the use and misuse of antibiotics and hormones, as well as poor care and handling of animals. And this was really the first time that this had been shown to the public. With her book came a public outcry, and what ensued was the formation of the Brambell Committee. Now the Brambell Committee was appointed by the UK government to examine conditions of intensive livestock husbandry and then give advice on welfare standards. They came out with the Brambell Report in 1965. The legacy of the Brambell Report is that they did acknowledge that confinement may offer many advantages to animals, such as shelter, freedom from predators, as well as a decreased disease pressure by being in these buildings. They also allowed, however, the notion that animals can suffer, and gave us the concept that animals may have species specific behavioral needs that we also need to be conscious of. In the end, this is where we came up with the development of animal welfare science. The Brambell Report is also famous for giving us the five freedoms. And these five freedoms are freedom from hunger, thirst, and malnutrition by access to fresh food and water and a diet balanced to maintain full health. Freedom from pain, injury, and disease by prevention and or rapid diagnosis and treatment. And freedom from discomfort by providing an appropriate environment for that animal. We also have freedom from fear and distress by ensuring conditions and treatment which avoid psychological suffering. And the freedom to express normal behaviors by providing sufficient space, proper facilities, and social interaction. So in conclusion, animal welfare is an intuitive concept that's influenced by individual biases and cultural norms. It's fundamentally about what is being experienced by that individual animal. And the history of animal welfare science goes back to the 1960s and we have developed good and robust science ever since. Animal welfare science is the use of scientific methods to measure the welfare of animals which can inform our ethical decisions about an animal's welfare.
