Cattle movements ‘relatively unimportant’ in TB spread – Royal Society report

New research published today (Wednesday, February 13) by the Royal Society shows that cattle movements are responsible for just 16 per cent of bovine TB outbreaks.

In a report, based on an extensive analysis of breakdowns in 2004, scientists attribute three-quarters of outbreaks to 'local effects within specific high risk areas'. These effects, they conclude, are probably the result of the interaction between cattle and badgers. This includes transmission from wildlife and farm-to-farm spread.

The remaining 9 per cent of outbreaks were 'unexplained', with possible causes including unrecorded cattle movements.

One of the key aims of the research was to assess the importance of cattle movements in spreading bTB in the context of the introduction of compulsory pre-movement bTB testing for cattle moving from high risk areas.

The scientists point out that pre-movement testing costs up to £6 million per annum. Yet they conclude that cattle movements are of 'relatively low importance' in spreading bTB.

They insist the results are 'robust'. The conclusions on movements were based on a model that considered 130,755 locations, with 3,624,643 batched cattle movements between them over a fixed time period. There were 7,425 breakdowns over 6,139 premises over the same time period.

NFU deputy president Meurig Raymond said the report provided the Government with 'clear guidance on where its priorities should lie in bringing bTB under control'.

"We have always argued that in TB hotspot areas, which account for the majority of total TB outbreaks, far and away the biggest cause of disease spread was infection among the badger population," he said.