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The government has announced a review of it’s 25 year bovine TB strategy.
Prof. Rosie Woodroffe, Senior Research Fellow, Institute of Zoology, Zoological Society of London, said:
“Today’s announcements from Defra provide little to celebrate for either TB control or science-based policymaking.
“The review of the government’s 25-year TB strategy announced today is sensible, but disappointing because its scope excludes badger culling, which is the most controversial and least evidence-led part of the strategy.
“Indeed, two consultations announced alongside the strategy review signal plans to expand badger culling rather than re-evaluate its utility as a TB control tool. In one consultation, the government seeks the power to issue larger numbers of badger-cull licences each year. In 2017, nearly 20,000 badgers were killed across 21 areas totalling 8,500 sq km; Defra is considering licencing more than 10 new areas a year, so the total cull zone would start to engulf entire counties, and the numbers of badgers killed each year would climb into the many tens of thousands. Slaughtering wildlife on this scale needs to be well justified; unfortunately there is not yet robust evidence that the current badger culling policy is helping to control cattle TB. Expanding culling on this scale is completely at odds with Defra’s announcement, just last month, that post-Brexit agriculture policy will seek to reward wildlife-friendly farming through subsidies. Moreover, the cost of culling to taxpayers is substantial; in 2016 each badger killed cost taxpayers roughly £500.
“Even more bizarre is a second consultation, which proposes small-scale culling of badgers on and around TB-affected farms in regions where the TB risk to cattle is otherwise low. This proposal is surprising because there is very strong evidence that small-scale badger culling increases cattle TB, spreading infection to new farms rather containing it. The proposal thus seems likely to undermine efforts to control cattle TB, rather than improve them.”
Prof. Rowland Kao, Sir Timothy O’Shea Professor of Veterinary Epidemiology and Data Science, Royal (Dick) School of Veterinary Studies, University of Edinburgh, said:
“Four years is probably a good time to be looking again – we would have gone through a few cow generations of infection, and one whole cycle of testing in four year areas. Charles Godfray is a good person to lead it – sitting outside the research in it, and with his work leading Defra’s SAC. Another reason to think it’s good to review (other than the general one that it is always good to look at these long term strategies) is that there are all sorts of technical and data related developments that are proceeding at a rapid pace, and if there is a chance that we are ‘missing a trick’ then it would be good to know.”
Prof. Tim Coulson, Professor of Zoology, University of Oxford, said:
“I am delighted that a review of the TB control programme has been announced. TB is a dreadful blight on both livestock and wildlife, and in spite of a significant amount of effort by governments in recent decades to contain it, it remains a costly and serious problem. A review of what has worked and what hasn’t could prove extremely useful in informing future policy, and in reducing the impacts of TB, and possibly even eradicating it. Professor Sir Charles Godfray is well placed to lead this review, and I expect him to do a very thorough job.”
* https://www.gov.uk/government/news/bovine-tb-strategy-review
Declared interests
Prof. Rosie Woodroffe: “I have received Defra research funding in the past, and I have a proposal for badger vaccination under consideration by Defra at present.”
Prof. Rowland Kao: “Only declaration is that I sit on the Science Advisory Council (which Charles Godfray leads) and that I’m speaking as myself, NOT as a member of SAC.”
Prof. Tim Coulson: “I have no conflicts of interest to declare, other than working in the same institution (University of Oxford) as Charles Godfray.”