Impact of respiratory disease, diarrhea, otitis and arthritis on mortality and carcass traits in white veal calves

Table 6 Final linear mixed model with pairwise comparisons for the effect of the number respiratory disease episodes and other diseases on hot carcass weight (HCW) (kg) in 3210 white veal calves, housed in 10 herds in Belgium, 2008-2009

Variable	Level	Reference	ß	SD	P-value
Breed					<0.001
	Red HF	Black HF	−4.4	2.4	0.4
	Crossbreds	Black HF	3.0	1.8	0.48
	BB	Black HF	10.4	2.1	< 0.001
	Crossbreds	Red HF	7.4	2.5	0.02
	BB	Red HF	14.8	3.0	< 0.001
	Crossbreds	BB	7.4	1.5	<0.001
ADU (%)			−1.6	0.4	<0.001
Calf gender	Female	Male	−10.2	1.6	<0.001
Diarrhea	Yes	No	−9.2	2.0	< 0.001
ART and/or OTI	Yes	No	−9.1	2.6	< 0.001
BRD					< 0.001
	1 episode	No BRD	−8.2	1.3	<0.001
	2 episodes	No BRD	−22.4	3.8	<0.001
	≥3 episodes	No BRD	−41.6	8.3	< 0.001
	2 episodes	1 episode	−14.2	3.9	< 0.001
	≥3 episodes	1 episode	−33.4	8.4	<0.001
	≥3 episodes	2 episodes	−19.3	9.1	0.20

SD = standard deviation; BB = Belgian Blue; HF = Holstein Friesian; ADU = antimicrobial drug use expressed as the number of days on oral antimicrobials/total number of days on feed (%); BRD = bovine respiratory disease; ART and/or OTI = combining variable for calves treated for arthritis (ART) and/or otitis (OTI).

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