The Cost of Generic Clinical Mastitis in Dairy Cows as Estimated by Using Dynamic Programming

Schematic representation of the replacement and insemination optimization model used in this study to estimate clinical mastitis costs.

Retention payoffs under an optimal policy for a cow free of clinical mastitis (CM; solid line) and a cow that incurred CM in the same month (dotted line) by months after calving. Cows are in their third lactation with average lactation curves and without CM in the previous lactation. The cost of CM is equal to the difference between the retention payoffs of the healthy and CM diseased cows in the same month after calving.