With the publication of the first ESUAvet report from the European Medicines Agency ASU Platform, AnimalhealthEurope welcomes the agency’s efforts to ensure the establishment of the new IT system supporting the new antimicrobial data collection and reporting activities as laid out in the EU Veterinary Medicines Regulation (EU 2019/6) which came into force in 2022.

Since 2009, European countries had voluntarily reported sales of antimicrobials for veterinary use to the European Surveillance of Veterinary Antimicrobial Consumption (ESVAC) project. The last ESVAC report published in November 2023 with data from 2022 recorded a 53% reduction in antimicrobial sales since 2011, and this new report indicates that the overall downwards trend in sales is continuing.

Moving forward the annual ESUAvet report will document detailed and comparable data on both sales and use of antimicrobials in animals, both at national and EU level. The report will also document changes in trends and patterns on both sales and use, and will include species-specific data, beginning with food producing animals and then companion and other kept animals from 2030 onwards.

Roxane Feller, AnimalhealthEurope Secretary General commented:
“We are pleased to see that previously collected data from ESVAC reporting has been migrated to the Antimicrobial Sales and Use (ASU) Platform for use in potential trends analyses in future years. This new system marks a positive step forward in continuing to ensure measurable success from our efforts to promote animal disease prevention and encourage the responsible use of all medicines.

In this era of simplification, this is also an opportunity to further highlight the need to simplify reporting and ensure alignment in data reporting requirements between the EU and Member States. This will help ensure high quality data collection for more informed analysis, and can reduce administrative burden so our sector can focus on its core business: better protecting Europe against animal diseases.”