{"id":40080,"date":"2024-09-09T11:19:30","date_gmt":"2024-09-09T09:19:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/9356a71e-899c-4853-8c36-7d96fe0252b0"},"modified":"2024-09-09T11:26:40","modified_gmt":"2024-09-09T09:26:40","slug":"badger-culling-to-end-in-england-by-2029-but-will-it-help-stop-the-spread-of-btb-heres-what-the-experts-say","status":"publish","type":"rss_feed","link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbccountryfile\/rss_feed\/badger-culling-to-end-in-england-by-2029-but-will-it-help-stop-the-spread-of-btb-heres-what-the-experts-say\/","title":{"rendered":"Badger culling to end in England by 2029, but will it help stop the spread of bTB? Here’s what the experts say"},"content":{"rendered":"

An estimated 230,000 badgers have been killed in the past decade. <\/p>

By <\/p>

Published: Monday, 09 September 2024 at 09:19 AM<\/p>

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Has the new Labour administration called time on badger culling? It\u2019s not entirely clear, and wildlife experts are divided on the new course of action being proposed.<\/strong><\/p>

Minister for food security and rural affairs\u00a0Daniel\u00a0Zeichner\u00a0has announced<\/a>\u00a0 that badger culling, which has been going on for more than a decade in an effort to reduce rates of bovine tuberculosis (bTB) in cattle<\/a>, would cease within five years.<\/p>

A key component of the new strategy was the promise to establish a new \u201cBadger Vaccinator Field Force\u201d in an attempt to drive down the incidence of the disease in badgers. Many scientists believe badgers<\/a> are instrumental in passing it to cattle \u2013 hence why there has been a culling programme in place since 2013.<\/p>

ZSL<\/a>, one of the UK\u2019s leading wildlife research organisations, described itself as \u201cdelighted\u201d with the news that culling was to end.<\/p>

A study by one of its senior research fellows, Prof Rosie Woodroffe, has found that the percentage of badgers testing positive for bovine tuberculosis (bTB) dropped from 16% to 0% following vaccination.<\/p>

But what if badgers do not regularly pass TB to cattle? That\u2019s the view of the independent ecologist Tom Langton, who has authored several papers on the the impact of culling on rates of bTB in cattle. If that\u2019s the case, vaccinating them is pointless.\u00a0<\/p>

\u201cNo one has ever shown that vaccinating badgers stops TB in cattle,\u201d says Langton. \u201cIt\u2019s just a theory.\u201d The largest badger vaccination effort carried out in the UK was in Pembrokeshire, where some 5,300 badgers were immunised against bTB at a cost of \u00a31.6m, but Langton says it\u2019s not clear if it had a positive impact.<\/p>

There\u2019s no detail in the Government\u2019s announcement on how and when the vaccination field force will be set up. Vaccinating tens of thousands of badgers a year could be hugely costly, and there is little to suggest that the policy has the backing of farmers.<\/p>

The biggest farming union, the\u00a0 NFU<\/a>, has consistently supported the previous Government\u2019s culling strategy, which has killed an estimated 230,000 badgers. It pointed to studies that have demonstrated the effectiveness of culling in reducing bTB in cattle.\u00a0<\/p>

\u201cIt is absolutely vital that this new strategy draws on all methods to control this devastating disease, especially where peer reviewed science has demonstrated benefits,\u201d says NFU president Tom Bradshaw.<\/p>

But other peer-reviewed science has shown culling to have no benefit at all. Farmers are making some headway in tackling bTB, but it can be entirely explained by more rigorous cattle-based measures, some scientists argue.<\/p>

All round, efforts to tackle bTB cost the Government more than \u00a3100 million every year or more than \u00a31 billion in the past decade. This isn\u2019t the first time that the Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) has promised to tackle the disease once and for all \u2013\u00a0but to date, most new strategies have failed to significantly shift the dial.<\/p>