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Tuberculosis in cattle and badgers:
disease control, ethics and welfare
Review of SCAWS workshop, Moredun Research Institute,
Edinburgh 19 October 20006
Part 1: Introduction
Dr James Irvine
FRSE DSc FRCP(Ed) FRCPath(Lond) FInstBiol
Teviot Scientific at Cultybraggan Farm, Perthshire
and at Edinburgh
Filed 20 Nov 06
©www.land-care.org.uk
The Scottish Centre for Animal Welfare Sciences
(SCAWS) organised a workshop on the highly topical and vexatious
topic of tuberculosis in cattle and in badgers, and the relationship
between the two. The subject is highly vexatious because the prevalence
of tuberculosis (bTB) in certain parts of England, euphemistically
referred to as "hot spots", has escalated over the years
to truly alarming proportions (figure 1). It has also been well
established for decades that badgers are susceptible to tuberculosis
and that they favour livestock woodlands and farmland for their
habitat.
bTB testing intervals for cattle, 2005
These reflect the the bTb "hot spot" areas in the UK.
These areas have dramatically increased in size over the past 10
years
(Source: defra)
(To enlarge: Click
Here)
Although they are no longer rare or under threat,
badgers in the UK are a protected species. Under the banners of
"animal welfare" and "wildlife conservation"
certain lobby groups have whipped up public emotion in the UK to
such an extent that major problems have been created that now face
attempts to implement rational disease control, both in terms of
the cattle and of the badgers. As the Chairman of the Workshop,
Sir Colin Spedding, said in his introduction
"decisions made on the basis of emotion
are seldom right".
He also said
"solutions based on a single focus are
seldom right"
Sadly, it is also a fact that certain so-called
animal welfare groups have misinformed the public through making
statements which were claimed to be based on good science when they
were not. A clear example was illustrated by one of the speakers
at the workshop.
It is also of note that the Advertising Standards
Agency (ASA) recently upheld the complaint against a national press
advert for the RSPCA which featured a picture of a group of badgers
and stated (1):
"The badger is a protected species. Apart
from the thousands that the government is thinking of slaughtering
obviously. The main cause of the spread of TB in cows is cattle-to-cattle,
not badger-to-cattle. So what are some farmers putting pressure
on the government to do about it? That's right, slaughter thousands
of badgers.....'
Against his background the Workshop, supported
by the British Veterinary Welfare Foundation and the British Society
for Animal Science, attempted to advance the situation by bringing
together speakers from
-
an affected dairy farm,
-
a badger ecologist,
-
an animal welfare physiologist who had experience of the control
of
tuberculosis infected possums in New Zealand,
-
a vet practicing in a bTB area in Devon,
-
a former Chief Veterinary officer, and finally
-
an agricultural economist who was a member of the controversial
Independent Science Group (ISG) that has been involved in what
appears to some to be never-ending and unsatisfactory trials
relating to bTB control.
With this mix it should be possible to get a better
picture of what is going on in the UK and to put this into perspective
with what has happened - or is happening - elsewhere in Europe and
the rest of the world.
This website intends to
run a series of articles reviewing the presentations of each of
the five speakers at the workshop, and to conclude with an overall
picture of the situation, that is currently confused by high emotion
and strong political lobbying from single focus positions. Nevertheless,
it is necessary to urgently address the problem as it has serious
consequences both to the livestock industry and to the environment.
©www.land-care.org.uk
The above article is the first in a series
covering each speaker's contribution to the conference
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