Results of the Farming Against Wormer Resistance (FAWR) campaign survey reveal growing concern about wormer resistance – but confusion about the best course of action.
“There is no doubt that wormer resistance is a growing threat to the UK sheep flock” comments Fiona Anderson, Novartis Animal Health Veterinary Manager, “and the FAWR survey backs up the evidence that is already out there. The most stark finding for me was that well over half of farmers are aware of Anthelmintic Resistance (AR) occurring in their area – with levels as high as 78% and 76% in the South West and South Wales – however 75% of these farmers are not putting in place the correct actions needed to tackle AR. So, there is a relatively high level of awareness and concern, but still low implementation of the necessary strategies and tools to help avoid resistance.”
Lesley Stubbings, SCOPS representative and Independent Sheep Consultant agrees. “Three quarters of respondents were worried about wormer resistance, however less than a third had actually tested for it, which shows a gap between concern and action.
“Whilst a high number of farmers being aware of a possible productivity decline as a result of resistance is encouraging, it does reveal that testing is still not seen as a vital starting point for a robust worming strategy. This we do need to address, and for me was one of the survey’s most important findings.”
Charles Sercombe, NFU Livestock Board Chairman and professional sheep farmer draws on his own experience. “The key point for me, being a farmer, is that less than 30% of farmers had actually tested to find out their resistance status. On my own farm we have carried out faecal egg counting and resistance testing to try and isolate the resistant worms. We have then integrated a new wormer group such as the orange drench, depending on advice from our vet. However, as the FAWR survey highlights, this action is not being carried out extensively enough across the UK sheep flock.”
The survey also revealed the positive trend of an increase in contact between sheep farmers and vets in the last 5 years. Just under three quarters of farmers questioned looked to their vet for advice on worming with over half of them making contact more than twice a year. Resistance testing, in partnership with a vet, should always be the first step, explains Mike Glover, Veterinary Surgeon from Torch Farm Vets. “We engage regularly with our sheep farmer clients to ensure that they receive the most appropriate advice and aim to put in place an individual wormer management programme as an integral part of every farmer’s flock health plan. Ideally testing should be done more than once a year to account for the seasonal variation in worm species and resistance to wormers.”
The survey showed that a significant number of farmers are using the new wormer groups available. Lesley Stubbings, explains “Of those farms that confirmed wormer resistance, over 85% have subsequently incorporated a newer active into their worming programme, with the majority incorporating the fourth (orange 4-AD) class. However, this is still only a small proportion of famers overall and we need to work with farmers and their vets to increase their use in worm control strategies if we are to reap their full value in terms of resistance management.
“Using the new groups, in association with existing wormers, can help extend the useful life of the older wormer classes and farmers should see benefits in terms of lamb performance. Whilst it is easy to see the value of doing this when you already have the problem what would be much more useful would be to integrate them into wormer programmes at an earlier stage to prevent the problem from occurring.
“I would like to see worming strategies in place as part of an overall health planning and flock management package. So it isn’t just about worming sheep with anthelmintics, it is about pasture maintenance, general flock management, close monitoring and setting production targets. We need to monitor flock performance closely and ensure all procedures are in place to maximize productivity.”
The survey also highlighted an alarming lack of awareness about practice when quarantining incoming stock, with 32% not drenching and therefore increasing the spread of resistance. “Quarantine is another very important time where farmers need to take professional advice,” says Fiona Anderson. “Only by implementing a quarantine protocol using suitable actives such as the orange drench class, can farmers prevent importing other farms’ resistance problems and reduce the risk to next year’s lambs on contaminated pastures”.
Helen Langham, Category Manager at Novartis Animal Health, concludes “FAWR is an initiative we have undertaken to help the industry continue to address the growing concern about wormer resistance by facilitating further understanding on farmers’ awareness of the issue and more importantly what they are currently doing about this. Organisations such as SCOPS have carried out excellent work to date in raising awareness of this issue, and we hope the campaign is supporting this work. Working together and providing education on wormer resistance, we aim to slow the impact of this issue in the industry and make a real difference.”
The FAWR survey was completed by almost 400 farmers across all regions and age ranges and the data has been analysed by the campaign’s panel of experts in order to generate information for the sheep industry and address key challenges. These include understanding the reasons for a lack of implementation of best practice worming practices, and how to best optimise flock performance.
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