Industry stalwart Barry Newcomen calls for action on pink eye

A beef industry stalwart is vying for more research into pink eye, after half his herd contracted the disease over summer.

Beef industry stalwart Barry Newcomen is calling for further research into pink eye, after half his herd have battled the disease.

It comes as Meat and Livestock Australia closes its call for tenders to develop a minimum 80 per cent effective vaccine against pink eye.

Barry Newcomen on his farm at Ensay. Picture: Zoe Phillips

Newcomen Herefords stud principal Mr Newcomen said half his herd contracted pink eye over summer, and it had been a significant problem in the past two years.

MLA’s 2024 report showed pink eye costs the cattle industry about $9.67m annually.

Mr Newcomen, based at Ensay, was unable to sell 30 calves at the recent Mountain Calf Sales due to pink eye, and said his cattle offerings were lighter across the board due to slower weight gain.

“We’ve treated at least half our calves. We had 92 sale calves to wean, and 56 of them had pink eye,” he said.

“Eight of those were totally blind. I don’t know why, I’m trying to find out. Everyone has had pink eye troubles, and they were particularly bad. Why was one paddock bad, and the other not?”

Mr Newcomen called for further research into pink eye for preventive measures, and an investigation into a potential influx in eastern Australia.

“We’ve had dust, flies and grass all my life, and we’ve never had pink eye like we’ve had the past two years. There’s something seriously going on,” he said.

“It’s not just here, it’s all of eastern Australia.”

Pink eye, infectious bovine keratoconjunctivitis, is caused by bacteria and irritation, and shows weepy, cloudy eyes in livestock.

MLA’s research report said pink eye’s main consequences included significant treatment expense, decreased value, slower weight gain, mismothering of calves and bull fertility.

It expected there would be 10.25 per cent of Australian cattle contracting pink eye each year.

VFF president Brett Hosking said he had a small beef herd and treated one cow and a heifer for pink eye recently. They used preventive treatments, but he called it an “endemic problem”.

“It is certainly worse over summer, flies are about, dust is about and grass is about,” he said.

“It is a problem with cattle right across Australia, and farmers tend to accept it’s something they need to do, but that’s not necessarily the right attitude either, we need to continue looking at ways to eliminate it in the industry.”