Britain trials new test in fight against bovine TB
Date: 30-May-02
Country: UK
Ministers have been concerned at the spread of the disease, after Britain's testing programme was suspended for most of last year, due to the country's foot-and-mouth disease crisis.
The government was also forced to play down remarks from a veterinarian, who said recently that an outbreak of bovine TB in Wales could become more serious than foot-and-mouth, which crippled Britain's rural economy and cost more than two billion pounds.
Officials from Britain's Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) and the devolved Welsh Assembly are planning to trial the use of a blood test that would produce the chemical gamma interferon.
The gamma interferon test, which was endorsed as a supplement - but not replacement - to existing methods by a European Union Committee earlier this month, has been shown to pick up TB earlier than the commonly used cattle skin test.
Although normal TB testing has restarted, there was still a backlog of 22,500 cattle to be checked by the end of April.
"Although priority must continue to be given to reinstating normal disease control measures, we also need to address the underlying upward trend of bovine TB," animal health minister Elliot Morley said in a statement.
"It's important to make sure that data is captured from these trials in such as way that it can inform future decisions on policy option," he added.
Farmers have long blamed the spread of bovine TB on wildlife, notably badgers, but conservationists maintain it may be spread between the cattle themselves.
The new testing will be caried out alongside the implementation of the government's decision last month to resume badger culling field trials, which will kill around 12,000 of Britain's 300,000 strong badger population over five years.
DEFRA figures showed there were 726 new herd incidences of TB between January 1 and March 31, of which 396 have been confirmed, 192 are unconfirmed and 138 are still unclassified.
DEFRA said there were 478 cases in herds last year, but the figure is incomplete due to the suspension of testing.
Other research programmes are also underway, including work on how the disease is spread and development of a vaccine for long term use in cattle or badgers.