Strategies for Feeding Unweaned Dairy Beef Cattle to Improve Their Health

摘要

In intensive fattening cattle, little attention has been focused to discuss if nutritional strategies could help reducing the incidence and severity of the most important health disease in feedlot cattle: the bovine respiratory disease (BRD). Bovine respiratory disease has a great impact on animal productivity with great morbidity and mortality rates during the first months after arrival. Metaphylactic antimicrobial programs are used to prevent and treat it, however, this strategy fails in aspects of the prudent use of antimicrobial treatments promoting the selection for resistance gene determinants and antimicrobial-resistant bacteria. The present review tries to answer the question if there are any nutritional strategies that could help to reduce the incidence and severity of BRD in dairy beef calves. Dairy beef calves are the calves born in dairy farms, around 65%, that are not going to replace the dairy cows and are fattened and slaughtered for meat production. These unweaned and unwanted calves are not a priority for the dairy sector and as a result, their postnatal care has not been a priority for them, and they are considered a by-product. Currently improving their health and welfare is a worldwide concern.