The 'regional accents' of m.bovis.

It is somewhat unusual to find us agreeing with Defra on anything at all to do with 'bovine'  badger Tuberculosis. In fact we have been heard to say on more than one occasion, that badgers are not the problem, but Defra's attitude to the control of those infected with Tuberculosis, most certainly is.

So it is refreshing to agree with Professor Ian Boyd, Defra's Chief Scientist, on the regional patches of spoligotypes found in Great Britain. He explains:  

... when one drills down in to the details of this clonal complex within Britain one finds an interesting pattern. There are different forms of bTB in different areas. Put simply, if bTB could talk it would probably have regional accents. This implies, for example, that bTB from Somerset doesn’t mix much with bTB from Cornwall. Now, if you are in to bTB like I am, this is just fascinating.

Fascinating??? We could think of other adjectives - but let that pass. Professor Boyd continues:

It is also an encouraging signal that cattle movement controls to prevent the spread of bTB are working, as otherwise we would probably a lot more mingling of the bTB strains and an eventual blurring of regional distinctions. That there are still such thick ‘accents’ between regional variations suggests some success in containing them within their regions.

Without wanting to rain on the good Professor's parade, these 'regional variations' have existed for decades - and certainly long before Defra nailed our cattle to the floor. And we use Defra's maps to illustrate this. Nevertheless, the article is good and can be read in full, on this link.

Our more down to earth (and earlier?) view on these spoligotype groupings were covered in this 2006 post we looked again in 2008, and more recently in this 2012 posting.
And in 2007, Farmers Guardian also covered what Professor Boyd describes as the 'regional accents' of m.bovis.




For some time now, molecular geneticists have said that true cattle tuberculosis was eradicated by the country wide screens of the 1960s.

What we have now is 'badger adapted' tuberculosis feeding back up into sentinel tested cattle, and despite Defra's reluctance to publish anything other than the single confirming microbial sample, many hundreds of other mammals.




Professor Boyd finishes his piece with the following observation:

This leads me to an intriguing hypothesis; is SB0140 specifically adapted to survive and thrive in badgers?

You've got it.

But whaddya gonna do about it?

Do the maths.

Various of the advisory bodies on 'bovine' tuberculosis have, over the years, proposed a jointly funded insurance scheme for reactor cattle and possibly consequential losses associated with herd restrictions.

This works well with other diseases, and in some countries, with management policies for any wildlife reservoir, for bT uberculosis. The latest scheme to be hatched up comes from the Animal Health and Welfare Board for England (AHWBE) who will report their cash saving ideas findings in the summer.

Defra's deputy Chief Veterinary officer Alick Simmons, had this to say:

... using insurance in some cases could serve the dual purpose of reduce the liability on taxpayers for animal disease and ‘incentivising the right behaviour’ among farmers.

Weasel words if ever we heard them. But from Lee McDonough, Defra’s director for animal health and welfare, a more realistic approach. She commented:

AHWBE has had ‘some initial engagement with the traditional end of the insurance industry’. She admitted there are ‘complication and hurdles to get past’, the biggest of which appears to insurance companies’ concern that the disease risk is simply too big.

Farmers Guardian has the full story.

But back to those 'complications' and 'hurdles'. A decade ago, Owen Paterson, as shadow minister, asked exactly the same question regarding the underwriting of bTuberculosis by the main loss adjusters.
After they'd finished laughing, the answer then was:

Recent contact with insurance industry early in 2003 indicated that, although companies are honouring existing policies, they are not offering new policies to cover TB in cattle herds, particularly in areas where TB is increasingly prevalent. This is because farmers do not wish to take the cover in areas where the risk is low (such as Yorkshire), but do wish to purchase cover in areas of high incidence (such as the South West).

However, the insurance companies consider that the financial risks in offering insurance policies in areas of high incidence are too high at present.

In 2003, when that PQ was asked,  5,460 herds in great Britain had TB restriction notices served and Defra shot 23,972 cattle.


In 2012, 9,032 herds in Great Britain  had TB restriction notices served and Defra shot 37,754 cattle.

 Do the maths. The insurance industry has .... and if exposure to risk was too high in 2003, just take a long, hard, look at it now.


Insurance companies are in business to make profit and TB premiums drawn from farmers still able to get insurance, are hemorrhaging the company's bottom line profit when they make the inevitable claims.

And insurance companies are not in the habit of offering umbrellas when it's raining.

 

They don't like it up 'em...

During the last year or so, some Welsh badgers have had the benefit - or not - of a very expensive BCG jab.

 Ignoring the protocol adopted by the FERA 2010 'trial', which pre-screened its badgers for existing evidence of exposure to disease - and rejected about half - the Welsh teams ploughed into a grossly infected population regardless. They trapped any badger who volunteered - infected or not, and, while offering sympathy and often a TV camera, jabbed and released it.

The cost of this charade was revealed in this FW article as £662 per badger.

 But the latest figures released by Defra show that in January 2013, in the whole of Wales, cattle herds restricted by 'Badger' Tuberculosis numbered 1173. This is a 29 per cent increase over January 2012, when 906 herds were under restriction.

But in the Dyfyd area, which includes the 1,424 badgers jabbed with BCG in Pembroke, the increase is 31 per cent. Up from 487 herds under restriction in 2012 to 639 in January 2013.

 And Farmers Guardian reports an almost doubling of cattle slaughterings for Wales in January 2013.

In Wales, the number of cattle slaughtered in the month nearly doubled to in excess of 800, compared with January 2012, despite the Welsh badger vaccination programme getting under way last year.

So despite £662 per badger, and a blaze of publicity, if results are anything to go on, it could be said that those vaccinated Welsh badgers really don't like it up 'em..

Words fail us...

There seems to be a confusion about the colloquial title of the zoonotic bacteria known as 'Bovine' Tuberculosis in that it affects cattle - otherwise why would it be called 'bovine', Duh - but affects nothing else.

Whenever there is a badgery story or a cull feature in the newspapers, the Tweeters and Twitterers crawl out, many confirming their total ignorance of this disease. That is one of the reasons why we zapped the comment section on this site. Repetition and tiresome repetition which just confirmed the mind numbing ignorance of many commentators. And incidentally gave us an illuminating insight into the so-called education which many  of these baby Tweeters have received.

 Drumming up support for Brian May's anti cull marches, a story from Somerset carried some real howlers. Here is one such:

"bTB isnt TB, but I suspect you already know that ;-) To put it into perspective you've far more chance of getting struck by lightening than you have contracting bTB.”

Really? Ask Dianne Summers how she feels after eleven months of chemo-therapy, and now facing the removal of part of her lung. But we digress.

Several people affected by 'badger' Tuberculosis in the last few years, have caught it from their pets and companion mammals, who have had contact with infected badgers. These are the tip of an iceberg of exposure to this bacterium which we as a population, have never faced before. Milk was the easy bit. Test and slaughter the cows, pasteurise milk. Job done. But infected badgers? In your garden? In the kid's sandpit? Coughing over your cat, your alpaca, your dog? Tuberculosis is a slow burn disease. Exposure to the bacteria which cause it, now may take years to show itself. But eventually it will.

We are also up against the establishment with the reporting of m. bovis as a particular strain of tuberculosis. AHVLA describe the reporting and index case screen as a 'one way street', with possible exposure to farmers and vets passed up the chain to the Health Protection Agency, (HPA) but a big fat zilch in the other direction. HPA operate in their own private bubble.

 So for example, if a patient presents with possible 'tuberculosis', (which most doctors will have only read about, and HPA still refuse to acknowledge any other source for, except foreign travel, unpasteurised milk, homeless shelters and drugs) the diagnosis is recorded as m. tuberculosis complex.

Drugs are tailored appropriately and few spoligotype screens are done, except possibly in inner cities. But the drug regime for m.bovis is substantially different from that required for m.tuberculosis, and it is often altered to accommodate bovis, without the original data being changed. Both strains belong of course, to the group m. tuberculosis complex so technically .......

Thus a degree of under reporting is occurring. To what level, we can't say. But we can and do listen to the health professionals who administer these different drugs, and they tell us that m. bovis is 'substantially' under reported.

So to all you Twitterers, who genuinely think 'bovine' tuberculosis is a disease of cattle, and that they pass it to innocent badgers. Wake up. Another comment from the link above says it far more succinctly - but less politely, than we could:

It's that word 'bovine' plus an unshakable faith in badgerism. A cult job. Government couldn't give a flying Fork about cattle - or badgers, for that matter. But m.bovis is under OIE and EU statutes as a Grade 3 zoonosis which they must eradicate to protect mutts like XXXXXXXXX. But when you read comments like that, you really wonder why.”

For information, 'OIE' is the acronym for the Office des Internationale Epizooties and a zoonotic disease is one which affect animals, from which infection can pass to human beings.
 More on the different branches and known hosts of the bacteria within m.tuberculosis complex can be found on this yoosfool link.

A catch up ....

Apologies from blogger HQ - blogging light this week. This posting will be a catch upon some of our recent postings.

First an update on Dianne Summer's progress, after her recent scans and biopsies.
She tells us that unfortunately the scans revealed that she still has active infection in the lung lesion. This after 11 ( yes, that is eleven) months of drug therapy, which has just about floored her. And if that wasn't enough, she described the biopsy to remove samples for culture, as 'horrendous'.

Unable to be inserted nasally, the procedure involved inserting a tube through Dianne's mouth into her lung. Her face was covered with a mask to prevent infection to those conducting the tests and her blood pressure went through the roof. This poking and prodding lasted about half an hour.
We wish that Defra would take the control of so called 'bovine' tuberculosis as seriously.

Dianne's consultants are divided as to the next step in her treatment. One suggests removal of the affected upper lung lobe, while another wants to continue the drug therapy for a few more months.

She is not out of the woods yet.

So, a timely wake up call for all those pushing for abandoning all TB control in cattle, on the grounds of pasteurisation, abattoir surveillance and cost. That attitude is just plain reckless, when 'bovine' TB is infecting companion animals, pets and many other mammals.
 Those 35,000 sentinel 'messengers' which Defra shot last year, were telling us something. We ignore their message at our peril. This level of environmental 'bovine' tuberculosis is causing a dangerous spill over into many other mammals, and passing the cost of Dianne Summer's illness - identified as the same spoligotype as her dead alpacas, none of which had had contact with cattle - to a cash strapped NHS is not very smart.

Last month we reported outbreaks of tuberculosis occurring this year in 'TB free' Germany and Switzerland. Here it may be prudent to point out that 'TB free' does not mean zero cases. The term refers to the OIE's (Office of International Epizooties) definition of  what is officially tuberculosis free, from which Owen Paterson's Parliamentary Questions extracted the following answer:

 20th November 2003: column 1205W [ 140308]

The Office of International 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 satisfy the following requirements:

* bovine tuberculosis is notifiable in the country.

* 99.8 per cent of the herds in the considered geographical area have been officially 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).

We have already pointed out that in this area of the EU, sales of milk are banned from affected farms until they test clear; although if such farms can find dedicated transport and a manufacturing route, then the product may be turned into powder. But we understand that sales of meat are also banned.
The cost of all this is shared between government, farmer and private insurance with compensation paid for cattle taken. This money comes from the compulsory insurance + Government contribution but for production losses private insurance is needed. (In the hot spot areas of GB, no such insurance is available. Where it may still be offered, premiums have more than doubled and pay outs halved.)

 Diagnosis of TB in Germany and Switzerland, is primarily the intradermal skin test, followed by PCR (Polymerase Chain Reaction ) screens on inconclusive reactors.

Meanwhile, as Dianne Summers attempts to get her life back (her lung appears to be past repair), cattle farmers struggle with restrictions piled on restrictions piled on restrictions and the word 'Tuberculosis' fades from view - if it was ever there in the first place - the Twits and Tweeters are planning a March.





Nice poster. Shame about the message.

This disease is not about cattle, or badgers.
Already we are seeing spillover to and consequential human infections from companion mammals and domestic pets.

An eradication programme should seek to control and eradicate a killer zoonosis -Tuberculosis. Not any single species.

We forget that at our peril.

Tuberculosis - an anniversary.

(* This post has been updated)

Last year we had the sad task of explaining to readers that alpaca owner, Dianne Summers  herself,  had contracted tuberculosis. The type was confirmed as m.bovis and the spoligotype found to be the same as Dianne's alpacas which were euthanized in 2008 - 2009.

It is also the same strain found in badgers inhabiting that locality.





After a rocky start, including several chest drain procedures to remove fluid from her lung, in the spring of last year, Dianne was put on a vicious cocktail of drugs. But her body didn't take kindly to the onslaught and in early May she was hospitalised again in an attempt to balance the side effects of these drugs, with their expected benefit.

 It is a year since Dianne was diagnosed with tuberculosis and fourteen months since her illness started. On this anniversary we have been given permission to update you on her progress.







After 9 months of chemotherapy, which saw her almost bed ridden for weeks and left her very breathless and weak,  Dianne's drugs were withdrawn in early March. This was so that further tests could assess the progress of this evil disease. So far, she has undergone X rays and scans, had a trot on a treadmill and a bronchoscopy is planned. Dianne tells us that the scans revealed a:

"fist sized white patch on my lung, but in its centre is a black hole".

Her consultants are not sure yet if that 'black hole' is scarring, or the active but walled up infection, for which tuberculosis is renowned, which could break out again. Samples from the bronchoscopy will be cultured and meanwhile, next week, her drug regime will be reinstated.

* Meanwhile Dianne has undergone a PET/CT  or Positron Emission Tomography / Computed Tomography scan. This type of scan involves being injected with a radioactive tracer, and then a 3D computerised scan is taken. She tells us that she still suffers pain in that lung, and gets breathless easily.

 So for those who still think tuberculosis is easily cured and that a week's course of antibiotics will do the trick, think again. Dianne had BCG as a teenager and also had regular X rays during the passage of this disease through her alpacas and afterwards. .

This case is far too serious for our renowned cynicism, but Dianne's illness should remind us all that  mycobacterium 'bovis' is not a disease of cattle. It is a deadly zoonosis and should be treated as such.

And once again, as we wish her well, we are reminded that Defra still refuse to place camelids under their TB eradication umbrella and continue to drag their collective heels on a sound diagnostic ante mortem test.

Repeat, repeat and repeat.

We have spoken of a 'beneficial crisis' created by the zoonosis known as 'bovine tuberculosis' many times. And yet again, this feeding trough has proved lucrative for members of academia. This time the RVC (Royal Veterinary College) with not a little help from FERA, fitted tracking collars to badgers and cattle, and then tabulated the contacts. There were not that many direct contacts, but before our Badgerist friends get too excited, the indirect contacts were tracked too. And there were loads.

The paper reports that indirect contacts were shown

"... to be far more frequent with 383 records of badger visits to latrines located on pasture grazed by cattle, and 1,716 visits by cattle to these sites. “This suggests that indirect contacts might be more important than direct contacts in terms of disease transmission at pasture,” a paper on the research, published in the Cambridge University Press, concluded.

The paper is discussed in this article in Farmers Guardian. But this site is built on the foundation of Owen Paterson's Parliamentary questions posed almost a decade ago. And this is just one which tells a similar tale of 'indirect contact' and its expected consequences.

 6 Jan 2004: Column 248W
Mr. Paterson: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what assessment has been made of whether badgers infected by TB may excrete urine from which viable M. bovis bacilli may be isolated; what the typical quantities per millilitre are; and whether such levels are capable of causing infection in cattle through (a) contamination of feed and (b) other mechanisms. [144445]

Mr. Bradshaw: Some badgers develop TB infection in the kidneys 37 per cent. of infected badgers sampled post mortem between 1971 and 1978 m. bovis was isolated from the kidneys and may excrete M. bovis bacilli in urine. Urine is typically left in trails up to a metre or more in length and may be focused at a latrine or distributed more randomly as the badger forages. Concentrations of up to 300,000 bacilli per ml of badger urine have been reported and experimental nasal inoculation of cattle suggests that, at this concentration of viable microbes, less than 0.03 ml would need to be inhaled by cattle in order to promote slow infection.

 Investigations into infection of cattle from feed and other sources contaminated with infected badger urine are lacking. However, risk of infection to cattle by infected badger urine on cattle feed would be a function of the survival of the microbe in the feed (which is dependent on, for example, duration since excretion, moisture content of the environment, exposure to UV rays) the number of microbes consumed by the cattle and the method of consumption (i.e. ingestion or inhalation). I am unaware of measurements of M. bovis survival in cattle feed but the environment inside farm buildings is generally considered to be conducive to longer periods of survival than at pasture, where M. bovis in badger urine has survived for three days in summer and 28 days in winter.

Cattle appear less able to detect badger urine than faeces at pasture away from latrines. In addition, patches contaminated with urine detected by cattle appear to be sniffed more than those contaminated with faeces. Furthermore, some cattle do not select against latrines and freely graze over them. Therefore, potential sources of risk of cattle contact with infected badger urine include the ingestion of contaminated feed from feed stores or in troughs; investigation/grazing at and around latrines; and the investigation/grazing of contaminated pasture.

We are nothing if not persistent, so another slant at the same question,

 Mr. Paterson: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs pursuant to her answer of 8 December 2003, Official Report, column 212W, what inferences can be drawn from the preponderance of TB lesions found in badgers on post mortem examination arising in the lymphatic nodes of head and chest as to (a) the portal of infection, (b) the possible routes of infection and (c) the risk presented by those badgers to other animals. [150564]

Mr. Bradshaw: Infection with Mycobacterium bovis frequently causes lesions in the respiratory tract and the associated lymph nodes of badgers, which suggests that a common route of infection is by inhalation, or ingestion followed by inhalation. Where there is infection of the respiratory tract, it is probable that there are phases of M. bovis excretion of infected saliva via the respiratory tract, which may contaminate pasture or animal feed containers.

and another:

 29 Jan 2004: Column 482W
 Mr. Paterson: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs pursuant to her answer of 8 December 2003, Official Report, column 210W, what her estimate is of the typical proportion of badger faeces and urine deposited in latrines from a given social group; what proportion is distributed more generally over grassland; and what risk of M. bovis infection these deposits present to grazing cattle. [150550]  

Mr. Bradshaw: Work carried out by Bristol University suggests that the proportion of faeces and urine deposited at latrines vary with badger density. The proportion of latrines located in different habitats is the subject of current research at the Central Science Laboratory, the results of which will be published in due course.

The majority of cattle actively avoid eating grass contaminated with badger faeces but tend not to select against grass contaminated with badger urine. Since most faeces tend to be deposited in latrines, which are often large and obvious, while urinations tend to trail onto pasture, infected badger urine at pasture might pose a greater transmission risk than infected faeces. However, there is likely to be some risk of onward transmission wherever either infectious faeces or urine are present on land grazed by cattle.

New 'research'? The hell it is. The danger to cattle from the detritus left by badgers infected with tuberculosis has been known for decades and answered quite clearly in these PQs, which are 9 years old and archived under this tag.

It is high time that this lucrative gravy train reached its station and its many passengers disembarked for pastures new. Preferably pastures not contaminated with urine, pus, faeces or saliva from infected badgers, 38 per cent of which were found to be infected in this latest money spinner trial.

EDIT:
Scotland did a similar 'research' in 2009. We covered it in this posting. Their conclusion was slightly different though.

A success story - but not for Team GB

We've mentioned the TB eradication situation in other parts of the world on many occasions, but closest to home - and arguably one of the most successful eradication processes - has been in that undertaken in the Republic of Ireland.




Farmers Guardian has the full story and you can catch up on past policies in one of our a previous postings which will update you on the Republic's TB history and the success of its eradication policy.

But the two main reasons for the success of the programme, were explained by a diminutive professor who was soooooo proud of the political steer which he accepted for that hugely expensive charade in England, known as the Badger Dispersal Trial Randomised Badger Culling Trial.


In evidence given to the EFRA Committee on 18th June 2007, Professor John Bourne patiently explained the difference between the Republic's attitude to badgers and that which he encouraged in the UK.

On trial protocol, so different from that followed in the Republic, he commented that the Irish:

"...have less welfare considerations than we were forced to give to the trapping that we carried out on the trial"

From that we assume he means that the Irish Wildlife teams cleverly reinvented snares as 'stop snares' or 'leg restraints' and together with shooting the 'snared' animal, actually caught some infected badgers. Whereas Bourne's TB takeaways   cage traps were subject to huge interference and sabotage. Our Parliamentary Questions assessed this as 69 percent of all traps set to October 2003.
Bourne continued his evidence:

"Very importantly, there was 100 per cent farmer co operation and we did not get that."

Why was that then? The Badgerists tell their followers that all farmers want to kill all badgers. Annihilate, eliminate, exterminate is the mantra. But Bourne says the opposite: "we did not get that [ cooperation]".
And we are told both by farmers and ex WLU teams that this was because those farmers who had 'clean' badgers did not want them disturbed. However they would have been more than happy to cooperate with the 'project' if it was targeting only diseased animals.

But arguably the most important obstacle, Professor Bourne helpfully pointed out:

"... is that there is no Badger Group in Ireland".

And there you have it dear readers. Farmer cooperation and no Badgerists.

And the result in the Republic of Ireland is a drop from 40,000 reactors to just 18,500 in 12 years, using reactive culling around an infected farm. The Republic has achieved 100 per cent farmer cooperation and no May Rants which owe more to political prejudice than control of a Grade 3 zoonosis.

With a 2012 total of 38,010 cattle slaughtered, GB has the third highest carcase tally on record. So well done Team GB.

Polite memo to Dr. May.
After we have given publicity to your latest rant, would you be so kind as to adjust your press release? You destroy your own credibility by so blatantly  scalping   Defra's TB statistics. And if you really can't add and subtract correctly, perhaps stick to star gazing asteroids:  preferably several million light years away, where errors of such magnitude can be safely and unquestioningly fudged.
You know it makes sense.

TB free Germany and Switzerland ...

,... are no more, thanks to wildlife reservoirs which have fed the disease back up into cattle herds which have been TB free ( in the case of Switzerland) for around 50 years. We'll post the direct links to the reports in their respective countries and in their own language. As our co-editor so helpfully pointed out, Google Chrome has an instant translator.

 The stories are similar. In Switzerland, for the first time in 50 years, in the canton of Fribourg a case of bovine tuberculosis has been found.

"The authorities have imposed over the entire affected herd a lock and a milk delivery block."

The suspect cow was found at slaughter in early March. The piece explains that bTB may be transmitted to human beings, either by contaminated products or direct contact with an infected animal. As the products made from milk consigned by this farm were heat treated (pasteurised) before manufacture, the Federal Office of Public Health deemed them safe. The article continues:

" In adult cattle, the incubation time of the disease may take several months. Source of infection of bovine tuberculosis may be either other livestock or humans. The Swiss livestock was since the 60s free of tuberculosis. The monitoring program is based on the inspections in slaughterhouses. In the neighboring countries - France, Germany and Austria - will become increasingly cases of bovine tuberculosis registered in domestic and wild herds, especially in deer and badgers."

So our interest in this case will be exactly what measures the Swiss authorities take to protect their cattle herds from such wild vectors?

Another piece in Die Welt covers a widespread emerging problem with bTB in Germany.

  The strap line to the AP picture is this:

The Allgäu is one of the largest milk producers in Germany. But just the Allgäu mountain pastures where the animals graze, could become his undoing.

We know the feeling. The article explains that since 1997, Germany has been bTB free.

Actually Germany is officially in 1997 as free of bovine tuberculosis (TB). In Allgäu is the serious infectious disease [ bTB] that is transmissible to humans, but now resurfaced. More than 400 cattle had already been killed. It has the worst hit Oberallgäu. In the tourist area near the alps about 90,000 cattle are kept. Here veterinarians discovered 354 previously infected animals.

So, the cattle go out into the alpine pastures during the summer - and come back with bTB? The article leans towards that conclusion:

As a possible source of infection in cattle is deer - the cattle could have captured the pathogens in the summer on a mountain pasture. In order to prevent an epidemic, to the screening of herds now be extended to the whole of Bavaria. On farms in the Württemberg Ravensburg cases of TB were detected. "On four different farms were eleven and infected animals have already been culled," said a spokeswoman for the district office. The animals were last summer was on Bavarian Alps.

So Germany wants Bavaria-wide tests and a proposal from the Oberallgäuer State Office for Health and Food Safety (LGL) provides that in the entire State of all cattle aged over 30 months are tested for TB. In the counties along the Alps, it should be all cattle aged over 12 months. Farms that have infected animals in the house remain closed at least eight weeks. Is unblocked only after a follow-up confirmed that the remaining number is TB free.

"In other counties the Allgäu infectious disease has emerged. In Ostallgäu far 68 farms were examined. According to the district administration office in Marktoberdorf on three farms infected animals were discovered."

This disease hasn't bubbled up from cattle - this area of Switzerland has been trading TB free for 50 years and the Oberallgäuer region of Germany for sixteen years. So the UK's  'cattle to cattle' clack stumbles a tad. But of one thing of which you can be very sure, neither Switzerland nor Germany will put their trading status at risk as we are doing, by ignoring a developing wildlife reservoir of 'bovine' TB.

We watch developments with interest.....

EDIT
 News just in from Germany on numbers, and their preferred TB testing regime (unused for 16 years).

The latest update on the Oberallgau region has identified 184 farms with animals testing positive to M.Caprae. 530 animals have been culled. 4 more holdings in Baden-Wuerttemberg  had positive tests on animals which had grazed the alpine slopes last summer.

And there has been a change in the testing regime for Germany:

"So far, when reading the single skin test every inconclusive/positive animal had a blood sample taken on the day of reading  and this sample was tested with the Bovigam test.
The blood samples were sent to different labs and , surprise, surprise, results in most cases differed. So after much complaining and threatening legal action Bovigam is no longer used and animals are now tested with the comparative skin test.

From what I have learnt Austria and Switzerland don't use Bovigam at all but they do skin tests / PCR which is their official strategy."

Mmmm. So after playing with GammaIFN, Germany has reverted to our comparative intradermal skin test. And at least a couple of countries are up to speed with PCR, (Polymerase Chain Reaction) as a diagnostic tool for bTB  even if our efforts languish in AHVLA's cupboard. 



 

A Correction is needed.

Not from us, but one is most certainly due from the Badger Trust and 'Dr.' Brian May's Team Badger.
.
We pointed out in January, the outrageous spin which both groups had put on a totally incomparable set of figures. If you remember, they had compared the full twelve months of 2008 with just seven (January to July) of 2012 and announced a big fall in cattle TB. As in 44 percent. Obviously the result of all those extra cattle restrictions.

Following our posting, this statement downright lie was repeated, on the Badger Trust's site where they say:

"the bTB toll on farm businesses has been declining steadily over the last five years. There has been a 39 per cent fall in new herd incidents since 2008 - from 5,007 to 3,018. Over the same period the number of individual cattle slaughtered was reduced by 44 per cent – from 39,015 to 21,512."

The same lie appears on Dr. Brian May's Team Badger site. It is to be hoped that when out star gazing, Dr. May gets his light years a tad more accurate than this obfuscation bilge.

So what was the final 2012 vintage for Defra's cattle slaughterings, on the altar of Badgerist worship?

The full twelve months, published this week show an almost 10 per cent rise on 2011 and a very slight fall on 2008, which was one the highest on record. The number of cattle compulsorily and prematurely slaughtered is not 21,512 as quoted by the Trust and Team Badger. It is 38,010, a figure which may be subject to change, Defra explain.

Defra's tally of prematurely slaughtered cattle over the last five years is 183,452.

We can't tell you the percentage of herds under restriction, or compare them to previous years at the moment. SAM (Defra's new toy computer) has 'issues'.

 He's not the only one with issues. We have too. Especially with Badger Trust maths.

All gone......

This week the front page of the Farmers Guardian carries the heart wrenching story of one couples' loss of their lifetime's work. Their whole dairy herd.



These are some of the 97 dairy cattle, pictured the day before they were slaughtered.  Most were heavily in calf. The calves die too.

This herd is on annual testing, with clear tests prior to this January. So the test's reading day was a shock. So much so that Mrs. Bothwell was asked to return from work, to support her family as the test had revealed almost 100 reactors out of 150 milkers.





Occupying a newly built dairy complex, the Bothwells had invested heavily for their long term future in milk production to the highest standards. But it is situated next to the Football Association flagship, St. Georges Park.  which has also invested. Occupying more land than that which supports the Bothwells' cattle, the Park boasts 13 football pitches, 2 hotels and a conference centre - amongst other amenities.

                                                                                                                                                                                     

                                 


 It was built over the last couple of years and fenced last May, prior to the official opening by the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge.
The Bothwell's dairy cattle would have been turned out to graze at about that time.










However, the previous occupants of the 330 acre site, seemed unhappy with this arrangement, and have repeatedly broken through the perimeter fence.
Were they trying to get in - or out?
This is just one of several breaches and tunnels. 

  


Sadly, some have not made it, leaving their remains on the pristine pitches, where children (and adults) learn to kick balls around.









We've mentioned the effect that any change in habitat has on infectious badgers before. In an animal where tuberculosis is endemic, it  provokes the disease to 'infectious' status very quickly. AHVLA vets confirm that they have seen herds going under TB restriction  as pipelines, housing and motorways fracture badger territories, provoking the infamous 'perturbation' effect and fighting. And we saw it after FMD (Foot and Mouth Disease) in 2001, where around 11 million grazing animals were removed from the countryside in a very short space of time. No ecological survey was done prior to that carnage, but some incredible assumptions were made after it.

Having seen the photographs of the frantic attempts by badgers to enter (or leave?)  St. Georges Park after its development and the resulting carnage inflicted on this neighbouring herd of dairy cattle, we can only offer sympathy and support to the Bothwells. They are not alone.
After a vintage year for cattle slaughterings in 2012, we have heard of three more complete herd clearances this week and some horrendous losses too.

Badgers don't appreciate floods any more than we do: and if they can't swim and don't drown, they move. And then they fight. And then infected status becomes infectious and bingo, another herd bites the dust.

Gillian Bothwell told Farmers Guardian:

"Losing the animals - to see dairy cows that have lived here all their lives loaded on to a trailer - was more than heartbreaking. I can’t get over that we lost all those calves as well. I can’t bear to think of the calves going to the slaughterhouse. That really upset me. Louis has taken it very badly – he spent more time with his cows than me. In the first two weeks, I was quite scared. Farmers don’t talk, they keep everything inside.”

As they survey their empty sheds, this is all the Bothwells have left of their lovely herd of dairy cattle....

... and a view of 330 acres of a fenced, football play area with hotels, car parks - and no badgers.

Loophole or opportunity?

We have mentioned several times, the most irritating bloody stupid anomaly, where cattle, sheep, deer, alpacas and pigs can be screwed to the floor with movement restrictions, and yet by a quirk of legislation, badgers may be moved around the country, apparently with departmental blessing.


Two of the prime movers are the fragrant Mrs. Kidner - she of Secret World in Somerset and our old friends the RSPCA. You will see from the link, that Secret World are presently advertising for 'homes' for rescued badger cubs. Anyone can apply. Your place or mine?

 
Some of the earlier Parliamentary Questions raised by Owen Paterson MP in 2004, revealed this incredible opportunity for the spread of Tb by the involuntary translocation of badgers. We describe this as 'involuntary' because this is not when they walk into your farm by themselves, but when they arrive in the back of a vehicle and are released by 'others' in the name of 'animal welfare'.

From answers Mr. Paterson received, we would remind readers of just how open this policy is:

1. That it is NOT an offence to take a badger from the wild, if the reason for its removal is: "solely for the purpose of tending it".

Furthermore, as a native species: "there are no specific restrictions under current law regulating where badgers are released once they have recovered. Normally once fit enough to be released into 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 transmitting disease." 6th Jan 2004: Col. 249W [1444446]

Not by Secret World it isn't. See later.

2. The captive badgers are supposed to be tested three times using the old Brock test, which fizzled out as a live test as it was so unreliable. It delivered just 47 per cent sensitivity on a negative reading. However this procedure is not compulsory.

"testing guidelines are not mandatory, but are set down in a voluntary code of practise"

30th Jan 2004: Col. 543W [150609]

and:

3. Animals testing positive should be euthanized: but what about the animals they have socialised with? And who proposed this ?:

"This protocol does not advise destruction of badgers who have had contact with a test positive badger. It should be emphasised that this voluntary protocol was not devised or approved by Defra."

 6th Feb 2004: Col. 1109W [150583]

As we said in that earlier posting, who the blazes did devise or approve it then? And why cannot Defra lift its collective head out of the sand to block this very worrying (for cattle farmers) loophole?

We have heard of relocated badgers being taken to Leicestershire's new National Forest, to South Yorkshire and even further north and eastwards into areas of 4 year cattle testing. But from where have they come? As Ms. Kidner proudly told a local SW newspaper: some are 'from areas which are designated to be used in a badger culling exercise".
You really couldn't make it up.

Describing her work in Somerset at Secret World, Pauline Kidner wrote in the BBC Wildlife magazine (1999) of the difficulties of relocating badgers within the area where they'd been turfed out found. And even with the comforting blanket offered by Defra that these creatures would not have been moved out of the area, 'on welfare grounds' and to avoid transmitting disease', Mrs. Kidner tells us that:

" Recent events have led us to question the procedure. (Of releasing them back into the place from which they came.) Two badgers were brought to us and treated for fight wounds. After being released, both were returned to us after suffering further and more severe fight wounds. They had to be put down"

"Our rehabilitated badgers when released for some reason not known to us are not accepted back by their own kind. They must be returned to sites unoccupied by badgers".

So, in a nutshell:
There are no restrictions on where 'sick / mended' badgers are released by such 'sanctuaries'.
These places are not licensed by Defra, and although they may use a 'voluntary protocol' to release badgers, this is neither drawn up nor approved by Defra.
Animal hospitals are not legally required to test badgers for Tb before release.
And there are no statutes preventing the 'relocation' of wild animals - even diseased ones.

So there you have it. After a vintage year for cattle slaughterings, the lady is looking for volunteer land owners to re home badgers from areas of endemic TB.

And the opportunity?
License and control these operations. Bring them in from the cold: use PCR to screen their rescues and then use them as restocks after clearing out the infected badgers and filling in their dirty ancestral homes setts?

Vaccines - not new.

There has been much twittering about vaccines and TB recently, as if it were something quite new.

After a consultation which ended in January, the EFRA committee are discussing it next week. On February 26th they will interview the European Commission and on the following day, members of the veterinary associations and the VMD (Veterinary Medicines Directorate) which is the body in charge of licensing.

When talking to the VMD it is hoped that the Honourable members have familiarised themselves with the various levels of license on offer. In particular that awarded to badger BCG which holds a LMA (Limited Marketing Authority) license, in that while it does no harm to pre screened badgers, no data on efficacy was presented.

 BCG was developed over 100 years ago and at that time was also used sporadically on cattle. We are grateful for a copy of a Holstein magazine tracking the development of this dairy breed in the United States. A passage from the 1964 issue which describes the use of BCG in cattle, starts with the description of a sale in 1917 of a very prestigious herd and a bull called King of The Pontiacs. The daughters of this bull sold well, averaging $1,240 but the twelve year old bull was lame with a baffling foot problem.
 However a couple of days before the sale he was photographed serving a cow, and presented for sale with the following information.

 "That he had never been tuberculin tested, but as a young bull he and few heifers had been vaccinated against tuberculosis 'as an experiment,"
The owner, Ward Stevens said of the bull to the assembled crowd:

"If he has tuberculosis, I don't want to know it and I don't believe that you want to know it either."

Such was the convincing and straightforward manner in which the bull's owner presented him, that the old bull sold for $10,500, and later changed hands for $15,000. As a young bull, he would have been vaccinated around 1911.

 BCG for cattle was not pursued as it had little effect, and worldwide it was felt that test and slaughter was the safer route to protect human health. In many countries that method has completely cleared herds of bTB.

Of course the exception to this success, being where a wildlife reservoir is left to upspill, in which case Defra, check your progress 1986 - 2012 in this posting, and hang your heads in shame.

Sort it out...

..... or the cash will dry up.

This was the blunt message from Tonio Borg, of the European Commission to Secretary of State, Owen Paterson, MP in a letter published this week. As well as detailing more clamp downs on holdings under restriction, and vaccination of cattle a distant pipedream, the letter reminded Mr. Paterson that:

"In the past four years the Commission has allocated considerable funds to support the UK bTB programmes (EUR 116,3 Mio in total). We therefore expect significant improvements in the epidemiological situation in 2013 that show efficient use of Union funds. This is absolutely necessary in view of a further renewal of the EU financial support to this programme."

The bulk of this European Union cash (or our own money recycled?) has melted away; hoovered up in a 30 per cent increase in testing. This arises from the doubling up of tests as required by the EU, so if cattle were the source, one could have assumed that the bTB problem would have been nailed by now?

Except that like so many other 'good ideas', the continuing testing and slaughter of sentinel cattle (and now sheep, goats, pigs, alpacas, bison and deer) is a total and obscene waste of time and money, if a wildlife reservoir is left to fester.

Better men have tried it and failed in the past.

And don't get us started on the cost of  badger vaccination.  An article in Farmers Guardian cites a spend of £943,000 to vaccinate 1400 badgers. That's £673.57 per jab - if our calculator's battery is fully charged. Forward costings in models proposing badger vaccination average £2500 per sq / km. And please do note that unlike the FERA trials of 2008/ 2010, this crazy paradigm underway in Wales, is aimed at a population of unknown size, badgers of unknown disease status and using a vaccine which holds no license for efficacy. Pretty smart?

Pretty damned expensive, especially as the Welsh Assembly Government confirm that far from reducing the numbers of cattle slaughtered during the months in which these badgers have been jabbed, the numbers of cattle slaughtered in the Principality is heading upwards again. Stephen Jones of NFU Cymru explains:

In 2010, a total of 7,619 animals were slaughtered in Wales due to TB, while the 2011 figure was 8,068 — but up until the end of October 2012, a total of 7,827 animals had been slaughtered and it is almost certain that the 2012 figure will be more than in 2011.

And before the Badger Trust launch into print with a headline citing a 'reduction' of dead Welsh cattle for 2012, remember dear readers, that the full year's figures have yet to be published.

Las Vegas Anyone?

Anyone feel like a bet? A roll of the dice?


We kid you not. Universities in Kent, Bangor and Kingston rolled a couple of dice after asking farmers if they'd killed any badgers illegally.


Farmers Guardian reports that University researchers  spoke to farmers at agricultural shows in Wales about the issue.

"... researchers spoke to 428 farmers at rural shows in Wales. Because of the sensitivity of the issue, researchers who carried out the study decided to adopt the ‘randomised response technique method’. The technique involves the person being questioned rolling two dice and following rules as to whether they should answer truthfully or dishonestly, depending on the numbers rolled. The researchers never know the result of the dice rolls, so they cannot tell if any specific individual may have committed an illegal act."

Dr Freya St John, from the University of Kent’s Durrell Institute of Conservation and Ecology commented:

"We believe this study makes an important contribution to that debate.”

It does? Really? And people get paid for this.

Go compare - a Badger Trust Recipe

In our posting below we queried how on earth the Badger Trust could have come up with such amazing figures on the b. Tuberculosis statistics for cattle breakdowns and slaughter numbers. If you remember, their press release chirped a 39 per cent drop from 2008 to an unknown date, in new herd breakdowns and a 44 per cent drop in cattle slaughtered.
David Williams, Badger Trust chairman said:

".... without any badgers being killed, but with increasingly effective cattle measures, the bTB toll on farm businesses has been declining steadily over the last five years. There has been a 39 per cent fall in new herd incidents since 2008 - from 5,007 to 3,018. Over the same period the number of individual cattle slaughtered was reduced by 44 per cent – from 39,015 to 21,512.

With the help of Bovine TB Information the source of this duplicitous rubbish deliberately misleading press release, is now revealed. The figures were given in Parliamentary briefing papers, are from the Defra website but relate to January - July only in 2012.
Not the full year, which has yet to be published.

The number of cattle compulsorily slaughtered as reactors or direct contacts was 21,512 in January to July 2012, compared to 20,514 in January to July 2011. The number of new herd incidents during the period January to July 2012 was 3,018 compared to 3,021 for January to July 2011.

So dear readers, a Badger Trust recipe for you:
Take the Defra statistics for cattle reactors and breakdowns in the 12 months of 2008.
Leave to stand for three years.
Take the Defra statistics for cattle reactors and breakdown in the 7 months of 2012, to July only.
Switch on the oven calculator.
Enter the 12 month totals for 2008, mix in 7 months of 2012 and calculate a percentage drop.
Go compare and publish.
Simples.

 For the pedantic among our readers, read page 8, section 3:2 on  this link to examine for yourselves the Badger Trust's amazing bit of mathematical gymnastics. The figures were published on October 12th 2012.

 This claim of a drop in TB incidence now appears on Team Badger's website, whose figurehead / underwriter is Dr. Brian May. And Dr. May has a degree in .... what? Hubris? Spin? Deceit? Lies?

 One can safely assume that it is not basic mathematics.

Froth or Fraud ?

From time to time the Badger Trust get over excited and publish press releases which are at best misleading and at worst downright lies very misleading.

We have mentioned this many times before, some of the more memorable being the incidence of TB on the Isle of Man and those incredible verbal gymnastics over badgers v. hedgehogs. Then there were those 14 million animal movements which extrapolated by Trevor Lawson to 1.3 million hops in each five weeks (shock, horror).... but turned out to be movement of data, not hooves. That particular press release chirped:

"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."

No retraction was issued when the correct figure of 2.2 million actual movements 'On' to farms was presented. John Bourne fell for that one too and repeated it often, but we digress....

Most recently, together with sett mates, Defra - a huge drop in cattle TB, was reported last year, due entirely of course to new and fierce cattle measures. Except it wasn't a drop at all unless one ignores the now devolved regions of Wales and Scotland. Which they may have done of course. All Defra's published stats relate to Great Britain, so for accuracy we will compare like with like.

 So what are the Badger Trust saying this week? Their latest press release gets very excited about a possible marker for that failing BCG vaccine for cattle. That's the one with recorded  54 per cent efficacy on bos indicus cattle in Ethiopia and whose 'success' was measured if the animal was alive to be slaughtered at 3, instead of dead of tuberculosis at 2.  But the end of the blurb has the following statement, attributed to David Williams, chairman of the Trust:

".... without any badgers being killed, but with increasingly effective cattle measures, the bTB toll on farm businesses has been declining steadily over the last five years. There has been a 39 per cent fall in new herd incidents since 2008 - from 5,007 to 3,018. Over the same period the number of individual cattle slaughtered was reduced by 44 per cent – from 39,015 to 21,512.

Amazing. The 2008 figure is just about correct but the rest and the conclusion? Utter hogwash. We could say bullshit - but that's an insult to bulls. Thus David William's press release is utterly wrong and for once, Defra agree.

Their statement ahead of these figures (and please remember that 2012 has only the 9 months of January - September published) explains:

* The provisional September 2012 incidence rate is 5.0%, compared to 3.6% in September 2011. [snip ]

* The number of new herd incidents during the period January to September 2012 was 3,731 compared to 3,561 for January to September 2011.

* The number of tests on officially TB free herds was 54,454 in January to September 2012, compared to 45,930 in January to September 2011.

* The number of cattle compulsorily slaughtered as reactors or direct contacts was 27,145 in January to September 2012, compared to 25,652 in January to September 2011.

And that's a drop of 44 per cent??? Pull the other one.

For the pedantic amongst our readers these are the full 5 year figures for Great Britain:
 2008 86,192 herds.  7935 under TB2.   (9.2%)   5011 NHI.  and 39,667 cattle slaughtered.
 2009 84.515 herds.  8386 under TB2.   (9.9%)   4599 NHI.  and 38,697 cattle slaughtered.  
2010 83,636 herds.   7964 under TB2.   (9.5%)   4723 NHI.  and 32,380 cattle slaughtered.
2011 80,446 herds.   8237 under TB2. (10.24%) 4897 NHI.  and 34,707 cattle slaughtered.

But to September in 2012 we see a drop now to just 79,666 registered herds of which Defra calculate 9.5% were under TB2 (herd restrictions) during the period with almost 200 new herds under restrictions compared with 2011, and an extra 1493 cattle slaughtered.
There are still 3 months to make those figures comparable for a full year.
('TB2' means a restriction for a TB incident during the year and 'NHI' are New Herd Breakdowns. And although Defra's tables show the total number of registered herds for 2008 and 2009 as 'unavailable', they are not. We have them from their previous publications.)

So there is certainly not a 39 per cent drop in new breakdowns and Defra have not shot 44 per cent less sentinel tested cattle. In fact these statistics look to be heading upwards again, in spite of cattle measures and badgers being vaccinated. Anyway, we are ever helpful on this site: so if those new spectacles don't do the trick, we suggest new batteries for the Badger Trust calculator. You know it makes sense.

Defra's full miserable, appalling, disgraceful figures tracking their 'progress' in eradicating tuberculosis in Great Britain from 9.2 per cent of registered herds with TB problems in 2008 to 10.4 percent in the last complete year, can be viewed by clicking on this link. (If the Excel page doesn't load, it can found at 'Regional Statistics' in downloads.)

More cattle measures - that'll do it...

On January 1st  2013, more cattle measures will be heaped onto GB's long suffering cattle farmers. We described them in October, and in this article, Farmers Guardian reported the bones of what was to come. They expanded a little more last week.

The EU's cash hand out for TB eradication comes with caveats for its use, so all the tweaks that Animal Health and their predecessors, the State Veterinary Service had put in place to enable farmers to 'live with' TB restriction over the years of their badger worship, are, with indecent haste, being unravelled. But still with no strategic parallel action on this most successful  much loved, iconic assets  of wildlife reservoirs.

In brief, the New Year brings trading opportunities which are severely curtailed. The movement window after a clear test shrinks to a mythical 30 days for herds under restriction. We say 'mythical' because that particular clock starts ticking on jab day, which means the first week is lost. So in effect farmers will be lucky to move tested cattle inside 22 days: throw in a couple of bank holidays and weekends together with a ten day notice period for AHVLA licensing, and the word we are searching for is .... 'stuffed'.

 Buyers with new herd breakdowns, often desperate to keep up milk volumes or slaughter throughput, will have to run the gauntlet of at least one 60 day herd test, and then a satisfactory AHVLA risk assessment before a license to purchase in can be considered. And the lifeline of Approved Quarantine Units (AQUs) for young calves from restricted herds ends now.

How we read that is that any calves purchased from TB restricted herds have to be taken through to slaughter. We'll stand corrected if this is wrong. Historically, the Approved Finishing Units have paid reasonable money for forward stock close to slaughter weights, but absolute peanuts for anything younger. So these calves may not have a sale value at all.

Pre movement tests for shows, and linked holdings have yet to feel the full force of restrictions on their movements. 

The comment sections of the farming press are full of gleeful and frequent 'Anonymous' jibes, that 'bovine' TB is being stamped down on. This is a disease of cattle, they tweet. So these measures should stop this disease in its brutal tracks, should it not? But what these people do not realise is that all these cattle-only measures have been tried before - and failed. Spectacularly, expensively and utterly.

We discussed Ireland's Liam Downie's attempts in an earlier posting, and even earlier than this, the late William Tait had no success at all, by nailing West Cornwall's cattle to the floor. Why would they, when the problem wasn't the tested sentinel cattle at all?

 But cattle farmers will no doubt accept this latest kick in the teeth tranche of rules and regulations with their usual stoicism because if these single species commentators are correct, then vaccinating their chosen species badgers and gluing cattle in one place should stop this epidemic in its tracks, shouldn't it?

So how long do we have to wait for failure this time? We now have over 10 per cent of GB herds under TB restriction in Defra's last twelve month period to report. Appalling. The NBA (National Beef Association) report that South Africa have already issued a ban on beef from cattle herds under TB2 restriction and although this being challenged "a positive outcome could take some time".

 And remember Russia? We do. We covered an previous international skirmish in several postings made during September and October 2004.

 And we also remember the parallel actions described by the European Union's DG SANCO, in the documents which proposed these cattle measures. But for your reference we will repeat them:

"The elimination or reduction of the risk posed by an infected wildlife reservoir enables the other measures contained in the programme to yield the expected results, whereas the persistence of TB in these wildlife populations impedes the effective elimination of the disease. Major socio-political resistance (lobbyism) against any measure involving the removal of infected wildlife or interventions affecting the environment are to be expected. The additional costs associated with these actions are not likely to be negligible".

But their latest report on GB's efforts to slaughter out its cattle industry was the hardest hitting yet:

"It is however of utmost importance that there is a political consensus and commitment to long-term strategies to combat TB in badgers as well as in cattle. The Welsh eradication plan will lose some impetus as badger culling will now be replaced with badger vaccination. This was not part of the original strategy that consisted of a comprehensive plan that has now been disrupted.

There is no scientific evidence to demonstrate that badger vaccination will reduce the incidence of TB in cattle. However there is considerable evidence to support the removal of badgers in order to improve the TB status of both badgers and cattle.

UK politicians must accept their responsibility to their own farmers and taxpayers as well as to the rest of the EU and commit to a long-term strategy that is not dependent on elections."

So we close 2012 with a toast to ... what? Blinkered stupidity? Government policy driven by vociferous, misinformed focus groups which has resulted in the unfettered spread to many mammalian species, including human beings, of that iron jacketed, zoonotic bacterium known as M. bovis?

Or the beginning of the end of of all that, with a balanced and tightly targeted eradication policy for Tuberculosis - wherever it is hiding.

We'll drink to that one, because despite the title of this posting, cattle measures alone will never 'do it'.

A Happy New year.

That magic roundabout again.

We have mentioned this roundabout several times. bTB has become a beneficial crisis, employing many on its tortuous and mainly circular route. But we've been here too long.

A 'new' paper published by Exeter University's Nicola Weber and others describes badger behaviour as 'correlating with bTB status. Well hallelujah for that. But here we have problem. This is not 'new'.

In 2003/2004 the then Shadow Minister at Defra, Owen Paterson MP, bombarded his counterpart at that department with the almost 600 Parliamentary Questions which form the basis of this site. We have them stored. One such, asked on 17th March 2004, asked:

".. to what extent and under what circumstances non resident badgers will visit setts inhabited by social groups to which they do not belong; and whether this represents a significant opportunity for the spread of TB between badger social groups" [ 157989]

And the answer, (almost ten long years ago)was :

"The most common reason for visits by badgers to setts within other social groups is likely to be breeding forays by males. This close contact between individuals from different groups is likely to represent an opportunity for the inter group spread of TB."

And along similar lines, Mr. Paterson also asked:

.. what is meant by a 'super-excreter' in respect of badger infected by TB and whether badgers so described exhibit atypical behavioural characteristics." [158375]

 The answer to that question was that 'super excreters' was a term given to badgers in the advanced stage of disease progression. And their behaviour, in 2004, was described thus:

"Research conducted by the Central Science Laboratory has identified behavioural differences between badgers excreting M.bovis, and uninfected animals. Badgers excreting M.bovis had larger home ranges and were more likely to inhabit farm buildings."

And so we come full circle dear readers, and many of those same old familiar names on this paper that have been making hay while Woodchester's peanut fed pets continue to cough, for decades. Not the same badgers it has to said, but their grandchildren, even great grandchildren, nieces and nephews. All merrily hoovering up taxpayer's cash, while their carers repeat previous 'work'.

The Western Morning News carries a piece about this latest paper, with Robbie MacDonald once again doing his Oliver impression:

"It would be valuable to test the relationship between behaviour and infection more thoroughly.

 No it would not. You already have the CSL research which answered that question a decade ago.
 Just Google it. You know it makes sense.

Happy Christmas...

Last year, after finding sacks of badger feed in the aisles of some pet stores, we wished readers a very happy  Brocklemas . Not that this gave cattle farmers under TB restriction much cheer, but as FERA reminded us in spectacularly 'unscientific' language, a badger holds 'iconic' status. And we said in the post below, a badger, even or especially one with tuberculosis, is a valuable asset....

This year we have picked up a video clip from YouTube which features some very cute alpacas and is set to a poignant background song. So when the animal rights brigade start rambling on about cattle and in particular dairy cattle in the same breath a 'bovine' TB, remember these popular companion animals. They are especially susceptible to 'badger' tuberculosis, highly infectious and as the skin test is bad at detecting exposure, inter herd spread is common. They have also infected their owners.

And also please remember the ongoing and concerted effort by the head counters in all departments occupied by AHVLA and Defra as they dumb down the sheer numbers of these delightful animals who have died when compiling their statistical tables. The tables are in no way comparable to the cattle TB statistics, in that they only count the single microbial sample which confirms m.bovis. No other deaths or euthanasia, even if TB is confirmed by postmortem or are the result of any TB disclosing test appear. These animals have just 'disappeared'.

Thus the true level of such losses, Defra hide in a web of their own deceit to avoid searching Parliamentary Questions.




 We thought this year, that just maybe, with the BBC's publication of a single outbreak of 'bovine' tuberculosis in which over 400 alpacas died the Ostrich mentality of Defra's statisticians may be shamed into reality. But we were mistaken. Just 30 samples appear on their 3rd. quarter samples table. And we note that many trace herds are still 'tethered' to the index outbreak, and counted as one.

So while these collective heads remain firmly in the sand and alpacas and many other mammals are dying of 'bovine' TB, spread by an 'iconic asset' of Defra's creation, there is only one place we can perch Santa's hat....

A very Happy Christmas to you all.

.