Modes of Killability: Individuals and Flocks as Patients in Veterinary Diagnostic Practices for Production Animals

ABSTRACT This article draws together sociological studies of diagnostic practice with human–animal studies and examines how Swedish veterinarians’ diagnostic practice for individual animals differs from diagnostic practice for groups of animals. The empirical focus of the article is diagnostic practice for dairy cattle and poultry in intensive production, and the study examines the relationship between knowing and managing disease and how the objects of veterinarian knowledge are shaped in interaction with animals’ social positions and their status as killable. The study shows that while diagnostic uncertainty is inherent in both dairy cattle and poultry settings, the enactment of disease, patienthood and appropriate response strategies differ significantly. The study argues that social aspects of diagnostic practice as well as the contingent character of diseases, bodies and patients are accentuated in relation to production animals. Moreover, the study shows how diagnostic practices participate in the ethical ordering of production animals’ lives and deaths but in different ways: They produce different modes of making animals killable.