Despite efforts by the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine to curb the spread of bovine tuberculosis (TB) by implementing a badger vaccination programme, incidence of the disease has increased.
That’s according to chair of the Irish Farmers’ Association (IFA) Animal Health Committee, TJ Maher who was speaking on the AgriFocus podcast on Agriland this week.
He explained that the DAFM implemented a widescale badger vaccination programme, however as a result of an increase in the badger population, the incidence of TB in the vaccinated areas has also increased.
“Sadly, this seems to be a correlation that’s emerging more and more, ” Maher said.
“In areas that were historically old vaccination areas, we are now seeing very significant breakdowns of the disease and when badgers are captured in those areas, there is a significant number of badgers who have disease in them.
“That’s extremely frustrating and concerning for farmers… this was a decision that was made by the state to broaden the use of the vaccination programme. Like with any vaccination programme it requires a huge level of the population to be vaccinated,” he added.
Maher explained that the farm organisation and farmers have concerns that not enough of vaccination has been carried out on the badger population where it was undertaken.
They are also concerned about a “subsequent growth of the badger population in those areas, because remember, we would have stopped removal of badgers in these areas when we started vaccination – so has there been an natural growth of the population in these areas as a result of that and has that put pressure on the vaccination system”? Maher said.
“We do not have a definitive outcome of what exactly has happened; what we do see very much though at the moment is very significant outbreaks in old vaccination areas and in many cases, the older the vaccination area, the more significant the outbreak,” he added.
“Historically it has happened in Monaghan, it has happened in Kilkenny, it has happened in Galway, it’s happening in Cork and those are very highly farmed areas, there is good land there.
“Farmers in these areas have suffered huge consequences for what has ultimately been a failure of this programme,” Maher added.
Badger
The IFA chair explained that Ireland’s incidence of bovine TB was down at about 2-3% from 2009-2013, compared to more than 5% incidence rate now.
“It’s our view very clearly that we need to revert to a badger density reduction programme at this stage, because we cannot continue to test and remove thousands and thousands of bovines and not remove enough of the host species,” he said.
“There is no doubt in Ireland that the badger, and in some cases deer, but predominantly the badger, are the host species.
“I often make the comparison, if there was 10 badgers taken out and two were identified with TB, that’s up at a 20% infection rate. We’re talking about a 5% infection rate in our cattle and we’ve a significant issue.”
Maher said he accepts that badgers are a protected species and any reduction would have to be completed within the remit of the legislation and licences sought, but he stressed that the TB problem is getting worse and action needs to be taken urgently.
To hear the full interview with TJ Maher about TB on the AgriFocus podcast click here.