Replacing Coccidiostats with Vaccination

The BroilerNet project involves a bottom-up approach to identify challenges and innovation needs for broiler farmers in Europe, and to collect promising and already successfully implemented Good Practices to meet the challenges in questions. The top Good Practices selected by experts within the three thematic areas (animal health management, animal welfare and sustainability) have been summarized in factsheets. Coccidiosis has been a widespread problem in chickens for many decades, including broilers. In addition to clinical outbreaks, the subclinical form of coccidiosis causes damage in the form of growth retardation, poorer feed conversion, and inferior financial results. This damage has been managed for decades by adding coccidiostats to the feed. However, the use of coccidiostats has long been a subject of debate. Coccidiostats not only increase costs but can also lead to resistance in chickens and potentially in humans to these agents, as well as to other agents including antibiotics. Nowadays, various vaccines against coccidiosis are available on the market, which can be administered either in ovo, at the hatchery, or in the barn.