Chronic Underinvestment In Animal Health Puts Everyone At Risk

The scale of global animal farming has made animal health inseparable from questions of public health, economic stability, and zoonotic disease risk. According to the World Organization for Animal Health (WOAH), more than 1.3 billion people worldwide depend on farmed animals for their livelihoods and nutrition, and global trade in animals and animal products exceeds US$500 billion annually. Yet preventable disease destroys more than 20% of global animal production every year — a recurring drain on resources that falls heaviest on the people least equipped to absorb it. The picture becomes even more urgent when zoonotic risk is factored in: around 75% of emerging human infectious diseases originate in animals, and roughly 60% of all known human infectious diseases have animal origins. In many ways, animal health and human health are the same problem.

The State of the World’s Animal Health 2026 is the second such report produced by WOAH, the international body responsible for setting standards for animal health and welfare across 183 member countries. Rather than a single study, this is a comprehensive policy and data report drawing on several global monitoring systems. These include:

• The World Animal Health Information System, which tracks disease outbreaks worldwide;
• The Performance of Veterinary Services Information System, which assesses the capacity and performance of national veterinary systems;
• ANImal antiMicrobial USE, or ANIMUSE, a database of global antimicrobial use in animals; and
• The WOAH Observatory, a data-gathering program that monitors the uptake of WOAH’s international standards for animal health and welfare by member countries.

Together, these systems allow the report to assess disease trends, veterinary workforce capacity, antimicrobial use patterns, and the state of animal welfare regulation across a wide range of countries. The report also incorporates perspectives from the World Bank, the World Health Organization, academic institutions, WOAH delegates, non-governmental organizations, and others.

The Need For Investment

The scale of underinvestment documented in the report is difficult to overstate. The global animal health market, encompassing both farmed and companion animals, has grown to approximately US$64.45 billion, yet this represents only about 0.6% of total global health-related spending. Development aid directed at veterinary services and zoonotic disease prevention amounts to less than US$1 billion per year, less than 2.5% of a global health aid budget that itself fell 23% in 2025 to US$174.3 billion. The report notes that bringing veterinary services worldwide up to international standards would require approximately US$2.3 billion per year, less than 0.05% of what COVID-19 cost in a single year.

The consequences of current underinvestment are concrete and visible:

• Between 2025 and early 2026, avian influenza caused more than 2,121 outbreaks across 64 countries, with approximately 140 million farmed animals dead or culled.
• Foot and mouth disease reappeared in Germany, Hungary, and Slovakia for the first time in decades and continues spreading into new regions of Africa such as Lesotho.
• Rabies kills an estimated 59,000 people annually, a toll described in the report as “almost entirely preventable,” as 99% of human cases result from dog bites and a dog vaccine costs a few dollars, while human post-exposure treatment averages more than US$100 per person.

Antimicrobial resistance compounds these risks significantly. In many cases, farmed animals are treated with antibiotics when better husbandry, biosecurity, and vaccination could prevent disease instead. The report projects that without meaningful action, antimicrobial resistance could cause more than 39 million human deaths by 2050 and US$953 billion in animal production losses. Yet animal vaccines currently account for just seven cents of every US$10 spent on antimicrobial resistance-related research globally. Meanwhile, 19% of WOAH member countries still use antimicrobials for growth promotion in farmed animals, a practice with no therapeutic justification and clear implications for resistance.

The Need For Animal Welfare Regulation

For advocates, one of the most significant findings in the report concerns the state of animal welfare regulation globally. Using veterinary services data from evaluations conducted between 2017 and 2023, the WOAH Observatory found that only 20% of member countries assessed had national veterinary legislation explicitly addressing animal welfare. The remaining 80% had no or limited alignment with WOAH’s own international standards on animal welfare.

Of 353 animal welfare-related regulations adopted globally between 2005 and 2023, approximately 70% originated in European countries, a stark regional imbalance that leaves most farmed animals in the world with minimal legal protection. WOAH recommends that member governments address key welfare areas, including slaughter, transport, research, and free-roaming dog population management, through legislation aligned with international standards.

The Need To Support Veterinary Services

Veterinary services are the backbone of any functional animal health system, yet the report’s data paint a mixed picture. On the positive side, 93% of member countries assessed reported that WOAH’s recommendations had a positive impact on their ability to improve their veterinary services, and 52% reported an increase in financial resources following an evaluation. Continuing education capacity has also held relatively steady, with 95% of members assessed twice or more between 2006 and 2023 maintaining or improving it. However, staffing is showing signs of strain: 18% of members assessed showed declining veterinarian capacity, and 22% showed declining veterinary paraprofessional capacity.

The report also found that 64% of evaluated members faced challenges in consistently engaging farmers and other stakeholders in veterinary services programs — a gap that matters because effective disease control depends on trust and cooperation at the farm level.

The Need To Include Wild Animals

The report also documents growing risks to wild animals. Between 2010 and 2020, the world lost a net 4.7 million hectares of forest per year. This habitat loss is pushing wild animal species into closer contact with humans and farmed animals, creating the conditions for disease spillover in both directions. The spread and persistence of African swine fever and avian influenza in wild animal populations now threaten biodiversity as well as farmed animal and human health. The report calls for integrated surveillance across wildlife, domestic animal, and human health systems, an approach consistent with the One Health framework.

The Need For Advocacy

To begin with, the widespread lack of animal welfare regulation is a concrete advocacy target. The data establish a clear normative baseline: most of the world has yet to adopt even the minimum international standards that govern how farmed animals are treated. For those working on legislative campaigns, the report can be used to demonstrate the gap between where governments are and where evidence-based standards point.

More broadly, the report raises a deeper question about whether the global animal health system itself is sustainable. The anticipated 17% increase in worldwide meat, dairy, and egg production by 2034 is projected to occur in a context where disease risks are intensifying rather than diminishing. The report doesn’t directly challenge the expansion of animal production, but its evidence base supports a precautionary argument: if animal health and welfare infrastructure can’t keep pace with production volumes, the disease burden, and its cascading welfare costs, will compound. While ongoing investment in animal health is crucial, advocates can also continue to press for policies that limit the scale and density of animal agriculture. Otherwise, we risk trying to manage an ever-expanding industry with inadequate prevention infrastructure.

This summary was drafted by a large language model (LLM) and closely edited by our Research Library Manager for clarity and accuracy. As per our AI policy, Faunalytics only uses LLMs to summarize very long reports (~50+ pages) that are not appropriate to assign to volunteers, studies that contain graphic descriptions of animal cruelty or animal industries, and research on niche topics. We remain committed to bringing you reliable data, which is why any AI-generated work will always be reviewed by a human.