...and now Scotland.

We are always grateful for new material, and this comment appeared after the 'So to Wales' posting;

Girvan TB outbreak 'No Cause for Alarm'
DAN BUGLASS

http://business.scotsman.com

"The Scottish Executive yesterday confirmed a significant outbreak of bovine tuberculosis (TB)on a farm near Girvan in Ayrshire, but joined forces with NFU Scotland in stating that there was no need for widespread concern for the overall health of Scotland's cattle herd.

On 25 January the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development in Northern Ireland informed the Scottish Executive's Environment and Rural Affairs Department that a cow that had been "exported" from Scotland had shown some symptoms of TB when slaughtered. The State Veterinary Service office in Ayr then traced the animal back to Enoch farm, near Girvan. Movement restrictions were imposed on 26 January and the suspect was confirmed TB positive on 23 February.

Further tests were carried out on the Ayrshire farm, resulting this week in the slaughter of 46 animals. The farmer will receive the full rate of compensation.

All cattle previously moved from the farm have been traced and are now subject to restrictions, isolation and further testing.

A spokesman for NFU Scotland said: "The incidence of cases of TB in Scotland remains extremely low. We had only 11 cases last year and 13 in 2005. That compares very favourably with the almost 2,000 in England and Wales in 2006, and even more the previous year.

"There has been a close working relationship between the Executive and the industry, and that explains why we have kept Scotland almost totally clear of TB." The thrust of that policy is that any animals moved from so-called hot-spots south of the Border must be subject to pre- and post-movement testing. Most of the Scottish outbreaks have been traced back to restocking programmes undertaken by farmers in the wake of the foot-and-mouth crisis of 2001.

The NFU Scotland spokesman added: "We have to stress that there is absolutely no risk to human health, but farmers must remain vigilant."

We are however a tad confused by the Scotish NFU's figures quoted in the piece above: "11 cases last year and 13 in 2005" the man said. Er - yes. But Ayr AHO reported 27 farms under Tb restrictions in 2006, 18 of which were CHI (Confirmed new Tb herd incidents) and these accounted for almost half of Scotland's total breakdowns. That total - from Defra's Tb statistics pages - was 58 herds under restriction, 44 confirmed and 277 herds under restriction due to Tb incident, overdue test etc.

And that is a long way adrift from 11.

And so to Wales

The Wesh Assembly is contemplating action on wildlife reservoirs of bovineTB after digesting the contents of the recent Welsh 'found dead' survey, which indicated that over a quarter of the badger carcasses presented, were displaying - er, bovine TB. Further to that, the spoligotypes found in the badger carcasses were the same as in slaughtered cattle within the same area.

The number of candidate carcasses does not include those who died underground out of sight and thus out of 'survey', but we will not be picky over that.

FARMERS WEEKLY reports a 'Complete change' as Welsh Assembly ponders badger cull to combat Bovine TB - but after the May elections you understand.

"The Welsh Assembly has taken a major step towards ordering local badger culls to combat bovine tuberculosis ..." Why now, may one ask?

"Wales' chief vet Christianne Glossop said it could not be determined whether the disease had originated with the cattle or the badgers, but Dr Glossop said diseased badgers were raising as many as four disease-carrying litters before the dams eventually died underground".

Actually, in many instances, it can be determined 'whether the disease has originated in cattle or badgers'. If no cattle movements 50 days prior to the previous Tb test have been recorded by the CTS (Cattle Tracing System) then by default, infection from cattle it is not.

"One cannot tell a sick badger....."

The following comment appeared on the site, after our posting "Survey after survey..." which we quote in full:

The Badger Trust has welcomed the admission by animal health and welfare Minister, Ben Bradshaw, that a cull of "sick" badgers is impossible.

Speaking in yesterday's debate on the dairy industry [1], Mr Bradshaw said:

"We are well aware that TB is a difficult problem. However, we also want to be careful to ensure that any decision on badger culling is guided by the science. We do not want to initiate any sort of action that could be counter-productive.

"As he [Mr Geoffrey Cox, Conservative, Torridge and West Devon] well knows, one of the things that all the science says is that a piecemeal, patchy culling regime for badgers could make matters worse. One of the other myths that a number of people still repeat and that it is worth exploding while we are on the subject is that it would be possible to have a cull of sick badgers. That is not possible. One cannot tell whether a live badger has TB. One can tell only through a blood test. Any badger cull would have to include healthy badgers, as well as sick badgers."

Responding, Trevor Lawson, public affairs advisor to the Badger Trust, said:

"The vast majority of badgers, even in bovine TB hotspots, are not infected with bovine TB. Of the minority that are infected, most are not even 'sick' - long term studies at Woodchester Park show that most badgers with bovine TB show no adverse symptoms and go on to live and breed normally for many years. Bovine TB is not even an important cause of death in badgers [2].

"Mr Bradshaw's admission that countless healthy badgers would be slaughtered in a badger killing strategy is welcome. It explodes the myth, repeated by the farming lobby, that only sick badgers would be killed whilst healthy badgers would be protected [3]. The grim reality is that a badger cull would be a grotesque slaughter on a massive scale that will irrevocably damage public support for farmers."

ENDS

1. See Hansard, 8 March 2007, Column 1657.
2. Cheeseman, C., 16 January 2006, Farming Today, BBC Radio 4. Dr Chris Cheeseman is the outgoing director of the Central Science Laboratory's research facility at Woodchester Park, Gloucestershire.
3. On 31 January 2007, the NFU used an opinion poll to claim that 74 per cent of the public supported a cull of sick badgers. The NFU did not report that the 38 people questioned in the poll had been told that the NFU wanted the "culling of infected badgers and protecting healthy ones, in much the same way as diseased cattle are dealt with at the moment". The panellists were not told that no such mechanism exists for killing the minority of infected badgers. On 13 February 2007, NFU deputy president Meurig Raymond admitted that "any badger culling strategy would need to be intensive and thorough". On 28 February, NFU spokesman Anthony Gibson admitted that virtually 100 per cent of the badgers in a culling area would need to be killed.

So despite all the cash, all the 'science', 'one ' may not be able to identify a sick badger? Not true. Another badger can and PCR could - given the political will to use the goddam thing. And that 'vast majority' of badgers which are not infected? Just how vast is a 76 percent infection rate in badgers trapped in Broadway Glos. 1986 - 97? (Bourne's 4th report to Bern Convention) Sheesh, talk about standing figures upside down.

It is absolutely no use the Badger Trust rubbing their hands in glee at these inane comments from a politically engineered spin doctor, which prevaricate the situation to an even worse level than now. We have said many times on this site that a blanket cull of badgers is as obnoxious and counter productive to us, as Defra's carnage was to most sane people during FMD. There is another way, and we are getting seriously fed up of repeating ourselves.

We have described the 'management' of large and mainly healthy badger populations in mid Devon, by man who lets the badgers decide who is sick. When they do and exclude it from the group, he will put this loner, this disperser out of its misery before it can infect anything else. That Tb is endemic in the badger population is not something of which the Badger Trust should be proud, nevertheless as this is the reality of several years of complete protection for the species, it is with this that we all have to deal.

Trevor Lawson is correct in quoting Woodchester's research on the length of time a badger can sustain itself, have cubs, and yet show no ill effects from Tb. That does not mean that it it is not infectious. In fact that is why a badger is such a successful maintenance host. It is not killed by Tb straight away and it can do all these things quite comfortably for several years - while shedding, and infecting everything it comes into contact with. However when the disease does start to debilitate a badger, the remainder of the group will oust it. And it it this 'badger' selection process which has been so successful in mid Devon, clearing a ' hotspot' of Tb in the cattle while maintaining the social structure of healthy badgers.

See BRYAN HILL'S story, which we covered in 2005. Thirty two farms in this 'managed' patch of Devon are still clear of bTb after 8 years.

For boys who like toys, rt-PCR does work on sett materials to identify those inmates capable of onward transmission of the disease, and leave behind the groups not transmitting and healthy. Warwick have had good results, others trying to replicate (repeat?) less so we understand. More recent work is encouraging - but again no fine tuning yet. No urgency there then? Personally we would lock all the researchers into rt-PCR and bTb in a windowless room; no coffee, no toilet - until they had sorted out a viable assay, and set a timetable for validating it. And we would have far more success if the Badger Trust would accept that there are people like us about, who have had no cattle to blame for extensive breakdowns, but who still only want to cull out the infectious badgers.

As farmer Malcolm Light from Hatherleigh, Devon at the recent NFU conference said to David Miliband:

"As farmers and stockbreeders we have been accused of spreading bovine Tb throughout the cattle and wildlife populations. We have been accused of making a profit from the disease compensation - and then complaining to government that it's all their fault. Tell that to the organic dairy farmer with a closed herd, who has never bought a cow in his life, lost half his herd to Tb infection [received 'compensation'] at a fraction of their market value, lost his milk contract, sacked half his staff, and couldn't replace these cattle even if he could find them, because there is no place for 'organic' cattle in the tabular valuation".

It will happen folks. It has to. The technology is there. It is the political will to use it that is missing and the result is 'A slight wheeziness' - or so the RSPCA would have us believe. The pictures tell a different story. And it is with this 'result' - the reality of endemic tb in the badger population - that the Badger Trust is 'delighted'.

Survey after survey after...

..survey. On what? How the public would react if a cull of infectious badgers is mentioned in the same breath as bTb.

After government's altruistic 'consultation' excercise of twelve months ago on this subject - despite being presented with an industry package, two parts of which the 'industry' has delivered - the NFU commissioned their own survey, and reported its findings a couple of weeks ago. After a favourable result, the organisation is said to be shifting all its lobbying efforts to that end rather than fight on the preMT issue.

FARMERS GUARDIAN carried the story a couple of weeks ago, describing the results of a poll carried out randomly by England Marketing. It showed that 74 percent of recipients supported a legal cull of badgers to prevent the spread of Tb.

And this week, another one. This time a survey into "Public Opinions on Badger Populations and the Control of Tuberculosis in Cattle", (sorry - no link) which was undertaken at the taxpayer's expense, by the Universities of Reading and Newcastle.

Their results mirrored the NFU poll. A combined telephone and postal poll of randomly selected recipients found that:

* 71 percent thought that management of badger populations is sometimes necessary.

* 92 percent agreed with the statement 'controlling bTb in cattle is important'.

But when asked whether bTb control should involve the management of badger populations, respondents were much more in favour of SVS / Defra influence than farmer licences.

* 49 percent agreed with farmer licences, compared with 36 per cent who disagreed.
* 68 percent agreed with the statement 'If badger populations are to be controlled, the Government should be responsible for it'.

And leaves the Right Honourable gentleman quoted in our post below, Lord Rooker, a tad adrift in his support of 'farmer licenses'. Not only do the contributers to this site feel Tb is a governmental responsibility, but the public appear to think it is too. While Defra ministers scatter weasel words like 'partnerships' around, what part of 'shared responsibility' does this administration not understand?

And how many 'surveys' will there be, one asks? As many as it takes to get the answer government wants to hear, one suspects.

(Survey published in full in Veterinary Record 24th. Feb. Authors R. Bennett and K.Willis. The study funded by Defra.
[No it wasn't, 'Defra' has no money. The long suffering taxpayer paid to support this 'beneficial crisis'- ed])

Farmers get the nod...

.. and depending on your point of view, Government shafts responsibility.


THE NFU on line site reports Lord 're-cycled' Rooker's speech to their conference as giving

"the clearest indication yet of how government intends to deal with the reservoir of bovine TB in badgers".

Having read Lord Rooker's speech, it is fair to say that 'government' does not intend to deal with it at all - it wants farmers to do the job. And to facilitate this, the 1997 moratorium on badger culling will be lifted after the final report of the ISG in June, (Do us all a favour John, collect your gong and just go. Now.)
We have described before the cavaliar application of law as far as the licence issue is concerned. And PQ's described the Minister's answer perfectly;

"It is current policy NOT to issue any licenses under sub-section 10(2) (a) to prevent the spread of bovine tuberculosis, except for animals held in captivity".

(18th March 2004: col 431W [158605]

But no discussion had taken place, no Statutory Instruments laid and in effect, British Law had been 'set aside' courtesy of the ISG. But we digress, that was then and Lord Rooker is now. But has anything changed? Not really. That goverment want rid of bovine TB is a constant, as is the fact that they still are unwilling to take seriously their own responsibilities in its clearance. And Lord Rooker's speech is the clearest indication yet that farmers will be given the green light after the ISG report - whenever that may be - to apply for licenses under Sub Section 10(2)(a)- to prevent the spread of tuberculosis.

While the NFU welcomed the news, they cautioned that any culls must be carried out in the context of a strategy drawn up with the full co-operation of the SVS. And the wildlife teams who advised and carried out such operations?? Err no, they've gone. Defra sacked them - or most of them - last year. Stood down, was the expression used. So 'farmers' are on their own with this one. But possibly clutching a licence to get Defra off a very sharp and costly hook, and to clear a disease which is 100 per cent Defra's responsibility. A disease which has severe implications short term for the country's trading status and long term for the health of all 'mammalian species' - including human beings.

The end of a dream..

Last week the
FARMING PRESS
reported that the SIMA show in France was the venue for Worcestershire breeder and dairy farmer, Richard Bown. His 'Richhaven' herd was all set to take 10 top flight cattle to the show and sale as a show case for UK stock.
But a comment on the posting below has alerted us to devastating news for Mr. Bown, and the end of a dream for promoting his cattle. His top cow, Ecstasy Journalist Roxy, owned jointly with John Jordan, failed a TB test. Full story is told
FWi site

Mr. Bown commented "It could devastate our business. Breeding stock sales heavily outweigh milk sales for us, but with a TB reactor in the herd, our opportunities to sell have been decimated. It's also horrific news for the UK as it will be another two years before the next SIMA, limiting the chances of showing the best of UK cattle breeding to potential European buyers."

And, as if the prospect of losing the cow wasn't enough, tabular valuations ensure that Mr Bown will receive just £855 - a figure he described as a pittance, having been offered around £40,000 for the cow.

With none of her daughters in the herd and currently unable to flush embryos, Mr Bown also faces losing the breeding lines of a cow which was just one of two second calvers in the UK to classify as excellent last year.

"The government must get on top of TB in this country and pay farmers fair compensation, to compare a cow of this breeding and performance to one in a standard commercial herd is idiotic. We'll fight this all the way, not just for us, but also for others who may end up in this situation." He said.

(Thanks to FWi.co.uk for the link)

Matt 5 under restriction - again.... Not.

In the snail mail post this morning came a missive from SVS, putting our SW Matt's herd under restriction.

Now this is a little odd, as our Matt 5, has tested his cattle - as instructed, and on time - and had a clear test. He even has a 'withdrawal of restriction' notice from SVS, a TB 10 form served just two weeks ago, and yet here, giving him indigestion as he ate his breakfast, was another movement restriction notice.

We are often asked on this site why so many farmers are (allegedly) under restriction "due to an overdue test" etc. And we have checked with LVIs and SVS and been told that in the main this is a time lag of paperwork logging into the main computer. Very, very few herds are genuinely refusing to test their cattle on time, and if they did, we understand that they would be in breach of Cross compliance for the Single Farm Payment.

We are most grateful for sight of an SVS TB 2 Update missive recently sent to veterinary surgeons, which describes just this point concerning compliance Statutory Management Requirements (SMRs):
"SMRs comprise a selected number of Articles from 19 EU Directives and Regulations( is that all? - ed) which are applicable to farmers. [ these] ... cover objectives in the areas of environment, public, plant and animal health ... "

"Few food bourne zoonoses have clear statutory obligations, but TB is one of those that does and the inspectorate for this SMR thus ensure that both the statutory surveillance test and pre-movement test (preMT) (if required) are up-to-date."

The paper goes on the describe circumstances where both tests have thresholds built in before a farmer will suffer deductions from his SFP for non compliance with 'up to date test, nevertheless, the clearance of bTB is, as the paper says, a 'Statutory obligation' under several EU directives.

Well that's the test bit sorted as far farmers are concerned - but what about Defra's part in the 'Statutory Obligation' to protect public and (all) animal health following on from the results of said test? We fully expect another committee will fit the bill.

Anyway, to return to Matt's case. What's gone wrong? Cattle tracing appears to be the bug in the system. In August, Matt purchased some pre movement tested pedigree cattle, whose home herd subsequently went down with lesioned reactors. So, the cattle tracing team clanked into action and demanded Matt test these purchased animals. Quite right too, and he did. At his herd test at the end of October. But at this test our Matt had a reactor too. A post movement tested yearling in which tb was not confirmed, so Matt tested again two weeks ago, and the whole herd - including the 8 animals to be traced - were clear.

SVS sent out a TB 10, lifting movement restrictions, but unfortunately 'somebody' forgot to tie in the trace animals - so Matt received a 'You Have Not Tested These Cattle' notice, which prohibited sales from the farm from - er three days ago. Shame that, Matt sold a whole shed load of store cattle the day before yesterday.
No he didn't. Not really.

But we confidently expect Matt's paperwork will show up as a herd 'under restriction for non compliance with Tb testing' on Defra's figures for February 2007 - even though it isn't and his cattle - all of them - have been tested.

TB-free Trading status

On 20th November 2003, the then shadow minister Owen Paterson MP., asked our Ben, Mr. Bradshaw the Minister responsible for Animal Health and Welfare - well most animals, not all - what was the OIE limit of incidence of bovine tuberculosis needed to maintain 'Tb-free trading status'.

The answered, archived with Mr. Paterson's other 538 parliamentary questions on this site, is as follows;

20th November 2003: column 1205W [ 140308]

"The Office of International des Epizooties (OIE) provides expertise for the control of animal diseases.
Article 2.3.3.2 of the OIE Terrestrial Animal Health code states that for a country or zone to qualify officially as officially free from bovine tuberculosis,it shall staisfy the following requirements:

* bovine tuberculosis is notifiable in the country.

* 99.8 per centof the herds in the considered geographical area have been officiallly free from bovine tuberculosis for at least the past three years as disclosed by periodic testing of all cattle in the area to determine the absence of bovine tuberculosis.

(Periodic testing of all cattle is not required in an area where a surveillance programme reveals that 99.9 per cent of the cattle have been in herds officially free from tuberculosis for at least six years).

So how do we fare? Well, Ben kindly gives us the figures for 2001, 2002 and 2003 and we have grabbed the calculater and worked out the figures for 2004, 2005 and 2006 (just posted with pride of course, on the Defra website).

2001 2.3 per cent of herds were under restriction due a Tb incidence.
2002 4.1 per cent
2003 5.6 (PQ answer showed 4.8 per cent to September only)
2004 5.68 per cent
2005 6.26 per cent
2006 6.5 per cent

So there we have it folks. For the OIE - as determined by the intradermal skin test - Tb free status kicks in at 99.8 percent of herds Tb free, or an incidence of just 0.2 percent. And what do we record? 6.5 per cent. See: Defra website

Even Scotland cannot 'stand alone' on this one, recording 0.4 herds under restriction in the period to December. And while the 'West' region (that's anywhere south of Bristol, by the way) shows an instance from 25 percent of herds affected during the period for Glos, 22.5 for Hereford, 21.5 Devon and 18 percent for cornwall, other AHO's are flagging up 'hotspots' where a few years ago there were none at all.

Shropshire now has nearly 8 percent of its herds affected, Somerset, Avon and Wiltshire 8 - 13 percent and in the East, normally a region associated with no tb at all, the Leicester office has almost 3 percent of its herds affected, and is showing an extra 13 herds under restriction from last month. Reading is similar, with 'amplifying incidence' in Defra-speak and 1.3 percent incidence involving 43 herds.

Our colleagues in the north are increasing steadily too, with Lincoln, Carlisle and Cheshire recording up to 2 percent of herds under restriction, while in the old hotspots of Stafford (Derbys) and Stafford(Stafford) 9.2 herds are under restriction.

All in all, nothing whatsover to be proud of. And risking the wrath of the EU, who are quite capable of serving up to Defra, the veterinary certificate see
here drawn up in 2004, which allows the Commission to institute a ban - at their discretion on ..... whatever products they wish.

See: here

SVS has already ruled out infected cattle...

A high profile Tb breakdown was reported this week on the farm of one of the industry's leading government advisors on ... bovine Tb.

During a routine test in december, almost 10 per cent of Bill Madders' dairy cattle were found to be reactors, and subsequently slaughtered, reports
FARMERS GUARDIAN

This is another case for those who would defend the badger / villify cattle (and raid the taxpayers' purse) to explain. The article describes the State Veterinary Service investigation as "ruling out infected cattle as the source of the outbreak", and quotes Mr. Madders confirms that he is 99 - 100 per cent certain that a badger sett near his grazing ground is the problem. " Local SVS say it [the breakdown] is almost certainly the result of badger contamination of the pastures last spring", he said.

Mr. Madders now joins the rest of us trying to balance his books with cattle numbers wildly fluctuating, influencing milk or meat output and thus his income, against his business's fixed costs, accentuated by testing all his cattle every 60 days. The cause of the problem, as ever is ignored. Mr. Madders comments that the future of this family dairy farm is in doubt unless he can resolve the problem of reinfection.

"If we are going to keep going down, it becomes uneconomical because we cannot replace the herd witin the levels of compensation currently available".

Mr. Madders was the chairman of the preMT group, but is adamant that the policy should have accompanied with a parallel policy to control bTb in wildlife. "The consistent view coming out of the SVS is that until we do something about the disease in wildlife, it will get worse. It is the politicians we are up against".

"Unless we do get action, the whole country will be infected within a couple of years. In places like the North West, it is going to spread everywhere", he said.

There really is nothing like a herd restriction order, combined with several slaughter notices to concentrate one's mind is there? Our sympathies go to Mr. Madders and his family - and especially to his cattle of course - it's reassuring to have a high profile ally. Mr. Madders will give a background briefing of his breakdown to the TB Advisory group on March 1st. The group reports to Ministers and the CVO - who will probably then ignore the fact that Mr. Madder's farm is surrounded by motorways, rivers or arable land, has had no breakdowns at all in two generations and has been a 'self contained' herd for 20 years.

New 'hotspots' emerge

Farmers Weekly reported last week on emerging new hotspots of Tb in areas where it had been unknown for years. ( That would be just like most of the contributers to this site, ten years ago then - ed.)

Sorry, no link to this, so we type it in full:

" Fears are growing that this spring might bring an explosion of bTb (in cattle) following last year's dry summer and changes to the skin test.
Devon farmer, Bryan Hill is certain that new hotspot areas are emerging across the region and will only get worse over coming months. "We have been Tb free for eight years but I expect it to come back this year following the dry summer."

With growing badger populations fighting over limited food resources, the weaker animals would have been more susceptible to disease, claimed Mr. Hill. They would have had to look for easier sources of food and water, bringing them into contact with cattle. "Tb takes seven to twelve months to show up on the skin test after exposure to infection, so I expect herds to start going down now".

Ben Bennett, DVO (Divisional veterinary Officer) with the State Veterinary Service agreed that Tb could increase this spring, as it had after previous dry summers. More cattle being tested before the intrduction of the new preMT rules on March 1st. could compound the rise, particularly if the (early) presence of of Tb had been missed last year with the change to Dutch tuberculin, which he fears maybe less accurate.

However, the new preMT rules were unlikely to have much impact on Tb in the absence of disease control in wildlife, said Mr. Bennett. "Cow-to-cow spread has not been a common occurance over the years. We are all aiming for a healthy population of cattle and wildlife but you cannot make inroads unless you deal with the disease on both sides".

One group of farmers in a new Tb hotspot is calling on all livestock farmers to write to their MPs demanding government action. Richard Turner, Neil Briggs and Alan and Susannah Hoskin's dairy herds near South Molton, Devon, all tested positive for Tb in mid January - for the first time ever.

A number of organic and pedigree herds, all have found the compensation to be inadequate; a particular problem for the Hoskins who have lost 32 of their 120 cow herd. A closed herd for the last seven years, the Hoskins' vet hailed their farm the 'most biosecure of any in his practise'.

"This is the biggest reaction we've ever seen and the only way it could have entered the herd was via a wildlife vector" said Alan Jacques from the Market Veterinary Centre, South Molton. "TB is a growing problem - and with the government just ignoring the reservoir of infection (in badgers) it is very difficult to see how we are going to to get it under control".

Quite.

1 - 15 per cent in 10 years...

.. and that is not cattle Tb. An increase of 14 percent infectivetity has been recorded in the 'stable and undisturbed population' of high density badger groups at living under the wing of Dr. Chris Cheeseman at 'badger heaven' - otherwise known as Woodchester Park.

We are grateful for a link to the NFU for the following piece on this astounding confirmation that if we walk away and do nothing, tb will only get worse - in both badgers and cattle:

"Badger study reveals TB upsurge

Wednesday February 14 2007

"Research work in Gloucestershire which has revealed a dramatic increase in the incidence of TB in badger populations has provided the clearest explanation yet for a parallel increase of TB in the cattle population, says the NFU.

A long-term study* of a stable and undisturbed high-density badger population at Woodchester Park near Stroud, showed that the mean incidence of TB in around 25 social groups of badgers increased from one per cent in 1994 to 15 per cent in 2004.

It also indicates that badgers are more likely to become infective if the social group from which they come is declining in size, and that a stable social structure tends to reduce the likelihood of disease spreading within the badger population.

NFU Deputy President Meurig Raymond said the findings provided striking confirmation, first, that the incidence of TB in the badger population has increased sharply and, second, that any badger culling strategy would need to be intensive and thorough if it was to have maximum impact on the level of disease.

“It would be entirely wrong to conclude from this study that a do-nothing strategy is the way forward”, he said.

“We have been doing that for the past ten years and the result has been a steep increase in TB in both cattle and badgers. To suggest that more of the same is the answer to all of our problems is sheer madness.

“The lesson from this survey is that, for the sake of farming, the countryside and wildlife, we must stop this frightening increase in TB infection in badgers, and the only way of doing that is through a co-ordinated cull of badgers starting in the worst TB hotspot areas.”

Ends
Notes to editors:
1. *Social organisation and movement influence the incidence of bovine tuberculosis in an undisturbed high-density badger population. J. Vicente et al. Journal of Animal Ecology 2007

Update on relocation of badgers.

We have covered the relocation of badgers extensively on this site, beginning with several PQ's to Baby Ben Bradshaw to ascertain what, if any, criteria applied when such actions took place, but also describing the 'protocol' of Pauline Kidner at Secret World - as described by herself. See August 2004 archive.

The answer to that was short and for hard pressed farmers with their cattle severely nailed to the floor, non too sweet. On Jan 6th 2004, Mr. Bradshaw replied to a question on any controls on the " movement of wild badgers for relocation", thus:

"....it is an offence to take, or attempt to take a badger from the wild, including for the purposes of relocation."

So far so good, except that our Ben also told us that of the cage traps set by Bourne's badger dispersal trial, 59 per cent were interfered with, and 12 percent went AWOL. Whether or not they were occuped at the time is not known.

Ben continued:
"As a native species, there are no specific restrictions under current law regulating where badgers are released once they have recovered. Normally, once fit to be returned to the wild, the badger will be returned to the location where it was originally found. This approach is recommended on welfare grounds due to their territorial nature, and also to avoid the risk of transmitting disease.""There is a voluntary code of practise covering rehabilitation and release of badgers..."

However, on 12th Feb. 2004, Col 1560W, Ben confirmed that
"Animal hospitals treating sick or injured badgers are not legally required to test animals for bTB before they are released from captivity".

This is with a test known as the 'Brock' test, which although reasonably good - in fact very good - on a positive response, is awful on a negative, having a sensitivety of only 40.7 percent.

Ben goes on to confirm ( 18th March 2004, col 433W) that if a 'disabled' badger is taken into care, then there is no legal requiremnent to notify DEFRA or to keep any records whatsover. And again on the 25th March " Animal hospitals treating sick and injured badgers are not legally required to test animals for bovine tuberculosis before they are released." A voluntary code of conduct applies, drawn up by the RSPCA, the Badger Groups and Secret World. Defra was not involved.

All this has come as bit of a shock to many. With an infectious disease endemic in the badger population (thank you Ben) and our cattle tested to distraction, why, may one ask is the release of badgers by various sanctuaries, individuals or well meaning organisations even contemplated?

Farmers Guardian covered this very well a week ago, (Feb 2nd issue) with Dr. John Gallagher describing the practise as 'folly', Prof. Tim Roper aghast with the comment "If government is contemplating culling large numbers of them, what on earth are we doing re-introducing them?" and Prof. Stephen Harris suggesting a rethink of the "protocol" - such as it is. Full story here.

Contributer update

You knew words wouldn't fail us for long didn't you? We ended the previous post with a reasonably polite (for us) expression of frustration at the incredible levels of infection found in trapped badgers during the 'Interim' strategy of 1986 - 1997. 'Interim' to us means temporary, or provisional. But ten years is an awfully long while to think about a strategy - about as long as John Bourne took to disperse that incredible 76 percent infection rate across Glos. and beyond....

A couple of weeks ago, we explained that testing cattle was taking up our time this month so postings would be sparse and we would let you (and our Trevor, who it must be remembered wished us well in the tests) how we got on.

Our East Cornish contributer is under a short voluntary herd restriction. He will test his cattle at the end of February in order to avoid having to preMT stock for sale in April. If he had tested in December, he would have had to fork out for a private test, and stress out stock for sale again 60 days later, so will do his whole herd test a tad later instead. We hear that quite a lot of December tests have been potponed by a few weeks for this reason.

Matthew 5, also in the SW has had a clear test. Very few lumps or bumps at all, and that after housing his cattle since October. He managed to keep those little black and white foxes out of the cattle sheds this year and is free to trade.

Our North Devon contributer has also had a better run, after housing several hundred cattle after reactors were taken in the autumn. A couple of inconclusives, but no reactors to slaughter. From former members of the old badger panel, we understand that this is a classic case of exposure to Tb at grass in the spring, found at a test in the autumn, which clears any reactor cattle out and by spring all should be well. (That didn't work with Matt 5's dairy herd as the little blighters were sharing the cattle feed in the winter and his problems - every 60 days - got a whole lot worse - especially after Bourne's rabid efforts and trashed traps and ...)

Staffordshire Matt tests this week. In snow and ice and wind and rain. Nice.

Herding Cats ..... again

In just over two weeks, the cattle industry faces another tranche of controls when pre Movement Testing (preMT) is rolled back to include all cattle over the age of 6 weeks if sold out of annual or two year testing parishes. The 'industry' led by the NFU have challenged both the basis of preMT, its cost and its ‘benefit’. They argue that the policy is disproportionate, with costs to farms far greater than the £7 per head predicted in the original data, and benefits (reactors found) smaller than was envisaged when the scheme was set up last year.

Chairman of the original preMT testing group Bill Madders, said that his group had argued for a proper analysis of the first year’s testing (in which only animals over 15 months were tested) before the age limit was rolled back and the policy extended. He also commented that the policy on its own was pointless … "fiddling while Rome burnt" ... , if no action was to be taken with the reservoir of disease in the badgers.

And there we have a problem. Leader of the new Tb advisory group Peter Jinman is all for extending preMT, with or without a wildlife management strategy. As is the BCVA (British Cattle Veterinary Association) - who are at least consistent in grabbing with both hands veterinary opportunities like …er testing cattle.

So once again the ‘Industry’ has split. And the cats are scattering in all directions, as shown at the TB stakeholders meeting in London last week, when CEO of the National Beef Association, Robert Forster argued vehemently for the extension. He is quoted as saying that to continue to fight against the March 1st. extended preMT regime, would "jeopardise the prospects of a badger cull", and he refused to sign the stakeholder statement. As did the BCVA, who as we said, are at least consistent in their search for veterinary opportunities.

One may ask what makes Mr. Forster so sure that Defra will deliver their part of the industry package this time round? This is a game where the industry is playing football, but Defra holds a cricket bat. Different game, different agenda. To survive in this murky world, honesty and straight talking are probably the best tools in the bag. Certainly not the spin and wheeler dealing we have come to expect and with which our 'industry' leaders cannot hope to compete.

The latest package to which the BCVA and NBA could not put their names, we show below;

STATEMENT FROM BOVINE TB STAKEHOLDER MEETING RICS, January 31 2007

"The meeting was deeply concerned at a further deterioration of the TB situation, which had resulted in a higher proportion of herds in England and Wales being under TB restriction during 2006 than in any other year in modern times.
It reiterated its view that TB will only be brought under control by a concerted programme of action embracing all aspects of the origination and spread of the disease and put into effect through a genuine partnership between the industry and Government.
With that in mind, it agreed the following points as being supplementary to the seven point programme of action agreed at the meeting on August 20, 2006:

* The Defra Secretary of State should be invited to visit farms in a TB hotspot area at the earliest opportunity in order to gain a full understanding of the dislocation, cost and suffering to people and animals alike being caused by TB and the measures associated with it.

* The meeting took due note of the very strong feelings expressed by farmers from the TB hotspot areas at the disproportionate and unfair additional burdens that would be imposed by the extension of pre-movement testing to younger animals and the likely consequences for the critical mass of the dairy and beef sectors in the areas concerned. The majority view was that the NFU should make a last ditch attempt to have the extension of PrMT to younger animals postponed until measures to address the wildlife reservoir of disease were introduced. In the meantime, it was agreed that farmers should be encouraged to provide as much factual information as possible on the cost, business disruption and accidents to people or cattle caused by the extension of pre-movement testing to younger cattle, so as to inform the Government’s ongoing review of the policy.

* The rules governing exempt markets and exempt fattening units to be reviewed urgently so as to make them easier to operate and thus ease the burden on farmers and markets in TB hotspot areas.

* Tabular valuation having been shown to be manifestly unfair, the Government should reintroduce individual valuation without delay.

* The TB Advisory Group and other Government advisers to be strongly recommended to visit the Irish Republic, so as to learn from the apparently highly successful anti-TB strategy that has been implemented in that country."
Ends.

It was 18 months ago when the ‘Industry’ presented government with a three part ‘package’. Then, the whole industry agreed (reluctantly) that cattle controls and tabular valuation should be introduced – but that to be concurrent with badger culling if Tb infection proved to be from a wildlife source.

Well, we know what happened then don’t we? Quid pro quo? Not a bit of it. Defra took the quid, (farmers paying for preMT and getting rubbish money for some seriously undervalued cattle) but did not deliver their ‘pro quo’. Instead we had that infamous consultation document, which had the RSPCA and the Badger Trust in overdrive, the former later being found guilty by the Advertising Standards Authority of running a campaign which was described a "unsubstantiated and untruthful". The latter still twittering on about 14 million animal movements, and shadowing the ISG’s badger dispersal trial reports like glue, even though the one of the trials’ managers is on record as saying what those of us unfortunate to have been involved knew – it was rubbish. And all the data arising from rubbish, is just that. Rubbish.

see our postings on the RSPCA's master of understatement:
http://bovinetb.blogspot.com/2006/02/slight-wheeziness.html
on the Krebs 'badger dispersal trial:
http://bovinetb.blogspot.com/2006_02_01_archive.html
and Paul Caruana's statement to the EFRA committee:
http://bovinetb.blogspot.com/2006/05/hold-front-page.html

But what is so disappointing is that far from uniting, the ‘industry’ has as many egos to support as ever, and while that continues, absolutely nothing will be done to control infection in the badgers. The Minister is not going to look in Appendix D, p.78 of John Bourne’s 138 page Fourth report to the Bern Convention, which put figures on the level of infection in badgers prior to Krebs in 1997… but we’ll give them to you here.

According the ISG report, in the years 1986 -1997, when the ‘Interim’ strategy was operating – or not, depending on one’s point of view – the level of infection found in badgers cage-trapped during the fraught and difficult badger removal operations in response to confirmed outbreaks of Tb in cattle were:

Up to 21 % in the West Cornwall triplet, 24% in East Cornwall, 25% in Devon, 37% in Cornwall/ Devon and the Devon / Somerset triplet. In North Wilts, up to 40 % of trapped badgers were found to be infected, in Hereford 51% and in Gloucestershire, the figure was up to 57% with Broadway (Glos) topping the league table with 76% of badgers found to be infected with Tb.

An infection level of up to 76 per cent? And that was in the period 1986 – 1997. Ten years ago and before the badger dispersal trial had a chance to ‘peturbate’ the problem. And John Bourne still wants to prove Tb transmission is cattle to cattle? And some stakeholders relish more cattle controls, when they know that up to 76% of the badgers are infected with Tb? Words fail us.

SPIN

…………… or in other words, the adroit circular movements of both the RSPCA and the Badger Trust with regard to farming data in general, and animal movements in particular. All 14 million of them, which, despite having the correct interpretation placed in his sticky paw, media adviser to the Badger Trust, Trevor Lawson insists on misunderstanding.

In order that the facts are clear to all – and that includes Mr. Lawson – your contributors have obtained the interpretation of movement data direct from BCMS (British Cattle Movement Service) and we print this below.

"We do require an ON and OFF movement for each animal when it is moved and both these movements are counted in the total number of movements. So the movement of an animal from farm A (off movement) to B (on movement) is counted as two movements in the total movements of cattle in the UK. If that animal goes through a livestock market it would be four movements "off" farm "on" market "off" market "on" farm or abattoir, and the movement from farm direct to an abattoir would also be two movements one "off" farm and one "on" to the abattoir."

So BCMS require two matching movements of data for each actual bovine trip, and if the animal moves via a market, then four are required. So how many were there?
For sure there were 14 million movements of DATA in 2005, but these comprised both ‘On’ and matching ‘Off’ movements, and also movements to dead end hosts – abattoirs, and visits to shows, exhibitions etc.

The figure BCMS have given us for total movements of data, both ‘On’ and ‘Off’ and including all destinations in 2005 is 14,661,407.

However the breakdown of this much quoted misinterpretation is:
Movements ‘ON’ to FARMS 2,718,599
Movements ‘ON’ to markets 1,999,974
Movements ‘ON’ to abattoirs 2,503,059
Other destinations ............ 59,251

A total of 7,280,883 ‘ON’ movements of which just 2,718,599 were ‘ON’ to farms.

BCMS also confirmed that of these 2.7 million movements (NOT 14 million Trevor) a number were made by calves under 42 days, which Defra say pose little or no risk.

"… around 401,000 calves under 42 days of age moved farms in 2005."

So the total live cattle moving ‘On’ to farms in 2005 was 2,317,599 – not including those young calves.


But what did the Badger Trust make of that information? And what is still being peddled to a gullible media? (see post below) This is from the Badger Trust website....

BADGER TRUST ; News Release 16TH February 2006.

Trevor Lawson, media advisor to the Badger Trust, commented:
"This decision demonstrates a shocking lack of courage on the part of Government. It means that around 1.3 million additional cattle movements will occur without pre-movement testing [2], spreading the infection even wider, …."

For further information, contact Trevor Lawson on 01494 794961 or 07976 262388.

And how did our Trevor arrive at that figure?

In the Notes to Editors is the following:

"Each year, the British Cattle Movement Service logs approximately 14 million cattle movements. Spread evenly throughout the year, this equates to approximately 1.3 million movements over five weeks.

The deliberate misinterpretation of this data is the worst type of ‘spin’ - but it is compounded by the diminutive John Bourne, whose address at the last ISG meeting carried the same totally misleading message. The minutes of that meeting however proved that Professor Bourne does indeed have friends in high places, who may understand the data - even if he does not. Reference to '14 million animal movements', heard by his audience at least twice in his address, was completely wiped. Well, well, well.

Trust in 'The Trust'?

Last week, one of our contributers bought a copy of weekly rural glossy 'Country Life'. This contained a lightweight piece on badgers and bTb written by freelance 'journalist', David Tomlinson. Now, the easiest way to produce copy, is to take swathes of scribe from somebody else - and to protect the 'author', ascribe anything controversial or even downright wrong, in their names. And so it is in this piece.

Much space is given to Trevor Lawson of the Badger Trust, who is attributed with the following:

"The Badger Trust estimates that [a culling programme] would result in a third of Britain's badgers being killed, a great many of them healthy individuals".

Not if PCR technology was used to identify infected setts Trevor. See our posting below.

And this little gem " According to the Trust, TB is spread by 14 million animal movements of cattle in Britian each year.."

Now this is really bad. Over a year ago, Trevor Lawson was told (and had, we understand, the paperwork placed in his sticky paw to prove the point) that the 14 million esposed by the diminutive John Bourne et al, mantra faithfully repeated by the Trust, was a movement of DATA - not hooves. What bit of 'On' and 'Off' = 2 movements, to each staging post, including markets( = 4 movements) and abattoirs did he not understand?

The figure for movements of live cattle ON to other farms is (or was in 2005) 2.7 million, including 401,000 very young calves under 42 days. So, around 2.2 million. Not 14 million at all. But it makes good copy, and lazy journalists obviously don't check. It is far easier to repeat dogma, than to 'investigate'.

And Bradshaw's "80 percent of Tb cases are spread from cattle to cattle" came up again, with no clarification of its context. These were the very few infected cattle which spiked short outbreaks in Cumbria after FMD restocks - all found, slaughtered and sorted. No, it should not have happened. With post movement tests which this site favours it would not have and Defra's testing programme for 'new and re formed herds' will prevent it happening again.

Then our Trevor endeared himself to his members by reiterating that cattle are giving Tb to badgers, "so it makes sense to focus on the cattle". That sounds good, and Defra are listening. Unfortunately with ears firmly shut, especially to experience of the past when the 'Downie Era ' in the Republic of Ireland did precisely this but with a burgeoning wildlife reservoir, failed totally to control bTb. Likewise a Cornish DVO in the 70's invented the word 'cohort', slaughtered many hundreds of cattle, implemented pre and post movement testing but totally failed to make a dent in the wildlife-borne infection cycle.

"Government received 47,000 responses from the public about the proposed badger cull - 96 per cent against it."
No mention there of the Advertising Standards Agency's damning censorship of this campaign. "Unsubstantiated and untruthful", the ASA found, but those words are missing from this piece.

The red corner is defended by the NFU and this in itself is 'unfortunate'.
Why not a vet? Especially a bTb expert ; someone from the State Veterinary Service for example, with years of experience under his or her belt - and also years of seeing first hand the devastating results of various political interventions and prevarications in a serious zoonotic disease prevention situation.

Why no 'google' into Bovine Tb, and all the parliamentary questions which form the basis of this site? A wildly out of date figure for badger numbers, (privately now thought to exceed 1 million) but no mention of the infectious load carried by a badger suffering the latter stages of bTb. This can be up to 300,000 units of bacteria in just 1 ml of urine. And that skittered across grassland and feed troughs at the rate of 30 ml in each void. And just 70 ml needed to provoke a 'positive' skin reaction in a cow. Not a squeak about that transmission opportunity.

No mention of the RBCT badger dispersal excercise, as described so devastatingly (and all in the public domain ) by Paul Caruana, one of its field managers.

No mention of the Thornbury exercise, where a complete clearance of badgers over several months was followed by a total clearance for 12 years of cattle Tb in the area. And the badger numbers recovered to their pre cull numbers. No other contemporous reason for this was found, other than the clearance of infected badgers, confirmed parliamentary questions.

And absolutely no mention of the diagnostics of PCR, which would answer many of the publication's readers' more anthropomorphic sensibilities.

And no mention of course, of the many herds who are under continuous bTb restriction, or who have had to give up cattle farming altogether but who have no bought in cattle or cattle to cattle contact. That would spoil a very good myth.

All in all, a very lazy and lightweight piece; Trevor Lawson managed to cover his badgers in inaccurate misleading propaganda while the villain of the piece, a highly infectious zoonotic bacteria lives on to kill more cattle and many more badgers, cats, dogs, free range pigs, alpacas ....... and human beings?

We are considering ....

.. the situation, said Mr. Bradshaw. Our Ben, baby Ben, junior Minister of animal welfare - well some animals anyway. This in reply to a parliamentary question posed by Jim Paice, his shadow minister and referrring to rt-PCR technology and the identification of bTb in badger setts, so successfully trialled last year... but now languishing it would appear, in 'somebody's in tray..

We have mentioned PCR many times on this site, not least to remind readers that such a magic box was offered on March 12th. 2001, by the late Fred Brown who had developed the American version, to detect with certainty the presence of FMD in cattle herds. Government turned it down in favour of the infamous 'carnage by computer' with led to the deaths, quite unecessarily in our opinion, of up to 12 million animals.

But things have moved on and we now a choice of magic boxes, some British (Enigma Diagnostics is one) some still in need of laboratory diagnosis but some described as 'real time' and giving results in the field in minutes - even when used by soldiers - or vets. Commercially the technology is now widespread in hospitals across the country, and offered by animal health screeners as an option in animal disease diagnostics.

Last year, Warwick University trialled the technology in the environment and in particular screened badger setts and latrines for bTb, precisely to avoid the mass wipe out so beloved of Defra (and John Bourne) and so emotionally fuelled by their incessant use of the 'E' word .... exterminate, exterminate exterminate. Like pre programmed Daleks, it keeps coming.

And our Trevor, Mr. Lawson has repeated the mantra, speaking of 'wiping out a third of the badgers in the country' in a recent glossy publication (which we will explore later, as he is also attributed with that '14 million animal movements' - again. Sheeesh. I thought we'd squashed that one)

We are most grateful to the ever vigilant www.warmwell.com for the following posting;

"James Paice asked yesterday when DEFRA "expects to undertake research on the use of Polymerase Chain Reaction technology to detect M. bovis in badger setts"[110858]

Unfortunately, Mr Bradshaw chose not to answer the actual question asked so we do not know when - or even if - scientific evaluation will follow up the Warwick work, reported on in March 2006. Dr Orin Courtenay from the University of Warwick's department of Biological Sciences said in the university department press release that the team did not advocate culling badgers to control bovine TB, particularly in light of the scientific results emerging from the Randomised Badger Culling Trial but that if the government did continue to cull badgers, culling should at least be targeted at diseased and infectious animals. Untargeted culling kills healthy and uninfected animals.

"With some further scientific evaluation, a "sett test" based on state-of-the-art molecular technology could provide a tool towards achieving this aim," he said.

Mr Paice's question was evidently asking about progress on this further scientific evaluation. It seems evident, from Mr Bradshaw's answer, that in the past year, DEFRA has done nothing more than "consider" proposals towards bringing forward a technology that is so vitally needed in Britain.

Why are we not surprised?

November stats.

For a short time only, Defra have posted the Tb statistics for January - November 2006.

http://www.defra.gov.uk/animalh/tb/stats/latest.htm

Defra describe the results thus:

"There has been a provisional 7% reduction in the number of new bTB incidents in Great Britain in January to November 2006 compared to the same period in 2005. There was a considerable drop in the number of new incidents in the first four months of 2006 compared to 2005. However, since May the number of new TB incidents reported in 2006 was slightly up on 2005. As a result, the percentage decrease in new incidents reported in previous months has now reduced" .


From March, when the drop in New Herd breakdowns was almost 30 percent, the fall (and thus increase) in bTb incidence has reduced and now stands at 7.2 per cent lower than in 2005 at the same time.

We have tracked these results with a great deal of scepticism, and reported our thoughts regularly. The immediate candidate for the fall was the substitution from September 2005 of our own UK produced 'Weybridge' tuberculin antigen with a product made by Lelystatd in Holland, which although a similar product, was found in the CVO's report to have given "a small but statistically significant difference" in performance. Annex C of the same report described the difference thus:

"The sensitivety of the combined dutch PPD is less because of failing to pick up NVLs ( animals which could be in the early stage of disease)... [ ] This would result in underdetection of cases, resulting in a transient decline in cases reported, despite there being no true decline in cases."
We covered this at http://bovinetb.blogspot.com/2006/08/going-dutch-2mm-difference.html

At the time of the CVO's report, the authors, despite blaming their veterinary practitioners for jabbing the cattle in the wrong way (Have they all been retrained? All of them? Really? Wow..) leant towards this explanantion, but is it the whole story? For figures to be comparable, the root raw data must be from the same source, and in this case it is not.

Data in the past has been drawn solely from routine tuberculin skin tests. For sure, as bTb increased, so did the skin tests as more and more parishes fell under annual regimes.
And over the last two years, Defra has come down hard on the cattle side of bTb - short of the obvious of course, and that means testing annually every herd in the country, but let that pass.

Parish testing intervals have been extended outwards, drawing more farms into more regular testing, but also farmers' own pre movement testing results will build into these figures, giving a further increase in herds and cattle tested which was not in the data from 2005 or prior to that. Defra are compunding this increase with a 'hypothetical drop' of around 23 percent in bTb, given the increase in testing. Into this mish mash of figures add gamma interferon, now in use in all areas but under different circumstances, and the picture is even more muddled.

It is our understanding that in areas of annual and two year testing, a third time IR skin tested would only result in around 15 percent failure rate. But those animals now get no third chance; after two Inconclusive tests, gamma interferon is routinely used. And it is giving a failure rate of 50 percent. For what reason we can only repeat previous info. That this diagnostic test is different, picking up antibodies to bTb in the animal's blood and that it is much less 'specific' than the comparative skin test. We understand that it is confusing, amongst other things paratuberculosis (Johnes disease) which may or may not be a good thing - but when lumped together in a bTb statistical context, is misleading. Many will argue, probably quite rightly, that in a hot spot situation, many cattle will have had a small exposure to m bovis, and thus need a higher exposure to provoke either the disease itself, or a skin reaction to it. But Gamma interferon will take out exactly those animals who have acquired this degree of immunity. For more see: http://bovinetb.blogspot.com/2006/11/new-leaflet-farmers-would-prefer-not.html

And then there is the weather. Blazing hot sunshine - with associated ultra violet - is the single most lethal influence on m.bovis. And we've had two consecutive summers, where its survival on grassland has been severly curtailed- to the benefit of any grazing cattle who may encounter it. The downside of the heat and the hard packed ground, is hungry badgers, foraging this summer, we hear, in farm buildings. The results of which will only show up in cattle tests this winter and into the spring.

But we are aware that with all these different data streams into the statistics, it is very difficult to compare. So we will concentrate on the figure which draws the attention of our trading partners. Bearing in mind that to achieve OIE 'Tb free' trading status, the number of herds under Tb restriction in a given period must be less than 0.02 per cent of herds registered on the country's database, the only thing we see, is that headline figure of GB herds under bTb restriction as a percentage of herds registered on Vetnet, is UP.

To November this appalling figure stands at 6.10 percent. An increase of 0.2 on last year.

They cannot be serious.....

It is difficult to find words to describe our reaction to today's headline in West Country newspaper, Western Morning News. Many times over the last couple of years, we have described the relocation of badgers - for whatever reason - as 'Tb takeaways'. This mainly because of the total ineffectiveness of the so called 'Brock' blood test, sometimes, but not always, used to identify lurking tb which although fairly good on a positive result, is only 40 per cent accurate on a negative.

We have also written of the dire results of Pauline Kidner's release policy from 'Secret World', in Somerset, where young badgers were chewed up by the indigenous brocks, resulting in Ms. Kidner releasing them elsewhere. Your place or mine? See: http://bovinetb.blogspot.com/2004/08/relocation-relocation-relocation-tb.html

The RSPCA, that veritable bastion of truth and guardian of all things four legged and furry- except cattle - which was found earlier this year to have used 'unsubstantiated and untruthful' (http://bovinetb.blogspot.com/2006/09/rspca-falls-foul-of-advertising.html )information to garner support for its 'Back off Badgers' campaign ( http://bovinetb.blogspot.com/2006/03/rspca-under-investigation.html) have done just that. Released a group of badgers in a Tb hotspot.

Read where at: http://tinyurl.com/vry8h

Local farmers seeing vehicles parked up with long antennae, were told that badgers had been released and these operatives were 'tracking them'. They didn't stay put on the few square yards of land authorised by the land owner then? Of course they didn't. They would be disorientated and a certain target for the nearest group to fight with. That's what territorial scrapping is all about. And that spreads Tb.

The more polite among us would say the RSPCA's action was misguided and unwise. Those of us on the receiving end of the Tb problem may be less charitable. Try ... recklessly bloody stupid. And who issued the goddam license ?

"Overall level of disease remains unacceptably high"

This the bland non-statement from defra when explaining this month's bTb statistics, which for a short period are available at: http://www.defra.gov.uk/animalh/tb/stats/latest.htm

Defra says:

"When making year on year comparisons of bTB incidence, it is important that these are not made in isolation but in the context of the wider disease picture over a longer timeframe. Whilst bTB incidence in Great Britain has fallen recently, this follows a steady increase over recent years. Furthermore, the overall level of the disease remains unacceptably high."

We are not taking anything in isolation. Nothing at all. We can read stats and also comments from our European masters. We see that Ireland have a handle on their problem and we do not. (see post below on how Ireland have halved Tb incidence and related expenditure)

Defra's latest figures show that this year's upward trend continues with the headline figure of 'New Herd Incidence' down during the period Jan - Oct by just 9 percent, from the dizzy heights of almost 30 percent ..... the figure which gave our minister such a splendid shield in March / April.

Herds under bTb restriction are again up on last year, both in simple numbers (+ 40) and percentages. And the percentage of herds under restriction because of a 'bTb incident' Jan to October was 5.67 percent of herds registered on Vetnet database. (To put that in context, the international bTb 'Tb free trading level' for a country is just 0.02 percent)

Posts have been a little sparse this last month. Apologies for that; your contributing farmers have been testing cattle and guess what?

Yup, three of us are under restriction. Again. Happy Christmas.