Veterinary public health (VPH) is a component of

public health Public health is "the science and art of preventing disease, prolonging life and promoting health through the organized efforts and informed choices of society, organizations, public and private, communities and individuals". Analyzing the det ...

that focuses on the application of

veterinary science Veterinary medicine is the branch of medicine that deals with the prevention, management, diagnosis, and treatment of disease, disorder, and injury in animals. Along with this, it deals with animal rearing, husbandry, breeding, research on nutri ...

to protect and improve the physical, mental and social well-being of humans. In several countries activities related to VPH are organized by the

chief veterinary officer Chief veterinary officer (CVO) is the head of a veterinary authority (typically a national government service comprising veterinarians, other professionals and paraprofessionals). They have the responsibility and competence for ensuring or supervisi ...

. Conventionally veterinary public health as a topic covers the following areas:

Food production and safety

It is desirable to consider food production as a chain, with animals reared on the

farm A farm (also called an agricultural holding) is an area of land that is devoted primarily to agricultural processes with the primary objective of producing food and other crops; it is the basic facility in food production. The name is used fo ...

(pre-harvest) then going for primary processing (harvest), secondary processing and distribution followed by final preparation (all post-harvest). This "farm to fork" concept can be easily described by considering a

beef Beef is the culinary name for meat from cattle (''Bos taurus''). In prehistoric times, humankind hunted aurochs and later domesticated them. Since that time, numerous breeds of cattle have been bred specifically for the quality or quantity ...

animal on a farm going to slaughter at the

abattoir A slaughterhouse, also called abattoir (), is a facility where animals are slaughtered to provide food. Slaughterhouses supply meat, which then becomes the responsibility of a packaging facility. Slaughterhouses that produce meat that is no ...

, then the

hamburger A hamburger, or simply burger, is a food consisting of fillings—usually a patty of ground meat, typically Ground beef, beef—placed inside a sliced bun or bread roll. Hamburgers are often served with cheese, lettuce, tomato, onion, pickles ...

production plant, then being distributed to a

supermarket A supermarket is a self-service Retail#Types of outlets, shop offering a wide variety of food, Drink, beverages and Household goods, household products, organized into sections. This kind of store is larger and has a wider selection than earli ...

. The hamburger is then sold, taken home, stored, cooked and eaten. Veterinary public health concerns all aspects of food production chain from controlling

epidemic An epidemic (from Ancient Greek, Greek ἐπί ''epi'' "upon or above" and δῆμος ''demos'' "people") is the rapid spread of disease to a large number of patients among a given population within an area in a short period of time. Epidemics ...

diseases that may impact on agriculture, to ensuring slaughter is conducted safely and humanely, to informing the public on safe ways to store and cook hamburgers.

Zoonosis control

zoonosis A zoonosis (; plural zoonoses) or zoonotic disease is an infectious disease of humans caused by a pathogen (an infectious agent, such as a bacterium, virus, parasite or prion) that has jumped from a non-human (usually a vertebrate) to a human. ...

may be defined as any

disease A disease is a particular abnormal condition that negatively affects the structure or function of all or part of an organism, and that is not immediately due to any external injury. Diseases are often known to be medical conditions that a ...

and/or

infection An infection is the invasion of tissues by pathogens, their multiplication, and the reaction of host tissues to the infectious agent and the toxins they produce. An infectious disease, also known as a transmissible disease or communicable dise ...

which is naturally transmissible between animals and man. They are a major public concern. Headlines on issues like

avian influenza Avian influenza, known informally as avian flu or bird flu, is a variety of influenza caused by viruses adapted to birds.

BSE BSE may refer to: Medicine * Bovine spongiform encephalopathy, also known as mad cow disease, a neurodegenerative disease of cattle * Breast self-examination Stock exchanges * Bahrain Stock Exchange, Bahrain * Baku Stock Exchange, Azerbaijan * B ...

(mad cow disease) and

salmonella ''Salmonella'' is a genus of rod-shaped (bacillus) Gram-negative bacteria of the family Enterobacteriaceae. The two species of ''Salmonella'' are ''Salmonella enterica'' and ''Salmonella bongori''. ''S. enterica'' is the type species and is fur ...

of eggs have dominated the UK newspaper headlines for the last thirty years. The picture in developed and developing countries may be quite different as far as zoonoses are concerned. In developed countries the

consumer A consumer is a person or a group who intends to order, or uses purchased goods, products, or services primarily for personal, social, family, household and similar needs, who is not directly related to entrepreneurial or business activities. T ...

has very little contact with the live animal, limiting transmission from live animals to the general public. In addition

food safety Food safety (or food hygiene) is used as a scientific method/discipline describing handling, preparation, and storage of food in ways that prevent food-borne illness. The occurrence of two or more cases of a similar illness resulting from t ...

is extremely regulated. Despite this food borne disease is still a big problem in developed countries. In the EU in 2006, a total of 175,561 confirmed cases of

campylobacteriosis Campylobacteriosis is an infection by the '' Campylobacter'' bacterium, most commonly ''C. jejuni''. It is among the most common bacterial infections of humans, often a foodborne illness. It produces an inflammatory, sometimes bloody, diarrhea or ...

were reported from 21 member states and reported cases will only represent a portion of the total. Veterinary public health concerns the surveillance and control of zoonoses at many different levels be it via disease control programmes at farm level or

wild animal Wildlife refers to undomesticated animal species, but has come to include all organisms that grow or live wild in an area without being introduced by humans. Wildlife was also synonymous to game: those birds and mammals that were hunted fo ...

s or in the abattoir.

Environmental contamination

Environmental pollutants Pollution is the introduction of contaminants into the natural environment that cause adverse change. Pollution can take the form of any substance (solid, liquid, or gas) or energy (such as radioactivity, heat, sound, or light). Pollutants, the ...

that arise through the keeping and use of animals may include

pollution Pollution is the introduction of contaminants into the natural environment that cause adverse change. Pollution can take the form of any substance (solid, liquid, or gas) or energy (such as radioactivity, heat, sound, or light). Pollutants, the ...

of the air, land or water. It can arise through

animal waste Manure is organic matter that is used as organic fertilizer in agriculture. Most manure consists of animal feces; other sources include compost and green manure. Manures contribute to the fertility of soil by adding organic matter and nutrie ...

products as well as

chemical A chemical substance is a form of matter having constant chemical composition and characteristic properties. Some references add that chemical substance cannot be separated into its constituent elements by physical separation methods, i.e., wi ...

s that may be used during production (e.g.

insecticide Insecticides are substances used to kill insects. They include ovicides and larvicides used against insect eggs and larvae, respectively. Insecticides are used in agriculture, medicine, industry and by consumers. Insecticides are claimed to b ...

antibiotic An antibiotic is a type of antimicrobial substance active against bacteria. It is the most important type of antibacterial agent for fighting bacterial infections, and antibiotic medications are widely used in the treatment and prevention of ...

s, etc.). In addition, practising vets will also produce potential environmental

contaminant Contamination is the presence of a constituent, impurity, or some other undesirable element that spoils, corrupts, infects, makes unfit, or makes inferior a material, physical body, natural environment, workplace, etc. Types of contamination Wi ...

s in the form of used needles, syringes, animal tissue and other

clinical waste Biomedical waste or hospital waste is any kind of waste containing infectious (or potentially infectious) materials. It may also include waste associated with the generation of biomedical waste that visually appears to be of medical or laboratory ...

. All of these materials have to be dealt with in a safe and controlled way. (See the sectio
Environmental Contamination
o
WikiVet
)

Role of animals in society

This aspect of veterinary public health deals with a number of

ethical Ethics or moral philosophy is a branch of philosophy that "involves systematizing, defending, and recommending concepts of right and wrong behavior".''Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy'' The field of ethics, along with aesthetics, concerns ma ...

issues.

Welfare of animals Animal welfare is the well-being of non-human animals. Formal standards of animal welfare vary between contexts, but are debated mostly by animal welfare groups, legislators, and academics. Animal welfare science uses measures such as longevity ...

is an ever present issue regardless of the setting, whether it concerns pet animals, production animals or wild animals. Where the line that defines acceptable and unacceptable welfare conditions lies is different for different individuals from different countries and cultures; however, it is common for minimum welfare standards to be defined in

legislation Legislation is the process or result of enrolled bill, enrolling, enactment of a bill, enacting, or promulgation, promulgating laws by a legislature, parliament, or analogous Government, governing body. Before an item of legislation becomes law i ...

. Other issues may concern the use of animals in

science Science is a systematic endeavor that builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe. Science may be as old as the human species, and some of the earliest archeological evidence for ...

, not just for

experimentation An experiment is a procedure carried out to support or refute a hypothesis, or determine the efficacy or likelihood of something previously untried. Experiments provide insight into cause-and-effect by demonstrating what outcome occurs when ...

, but the use of

transgenic A transgene is a gene that has been transferred naturally, or by any of a number of genetic engineering techniques, from one organism to another. The introduction of a transgene, in a process known as transgenesis, has the potential to change the ...

animals (an animals who has had its

genome In the fields of molecular biology and genetics, a genome is all the genetic information of an organism. It consists of nucleotide sequences of DNA (or RNA in RNA viruses). The nuclear genome includes protein-coding genes and non-coding ge ...

deliberately altered by

genetic engineering Genetic engineering, also called genetic modification or genetic manipulation, is the modification and manipulation of an organism's genes using technology. It is a set of technologies used to change the genetic makeup of cells, including t ...

techniques as opposed to

selective breeding Selective breeding (also called artificial selection) is the process by which humans use animal breeding and plant breeding to selectively develop particular phenotypic traits (characteristics) by choosing which typically animal or plant mal ...

) and

xenotransplantation Xenotransplantation (''xenos-'' from the Greek meaning "foreign" or strange), or heterologous transplant, is the transplantation of living cells, tissues or organs from one species to another. Such cells, tissues or organs are called xenograft ...

(the transplantation of organs or tissues from one species to another) or the emergence of

resistance Resistance may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Comics * Either of two similarly named but otherwise unrelated comic book series, both published by Wildstorm: ** ''Resistance'' (comics), based on the video game of the same title ** ''T ...

antimicrobial An antimicrobial is an agent that kills microorganisms or stops their growth. Antimicrobial medicines can be grouped according to the microorganisms they act primarily against. For example, antibiotics are used against bacteria, and antifungals ar ...

drugs due to their use in animals.Antimicrobial Resistance
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References

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{{Veterinary medicine Veterinary medicine Public health