Huge step forward in battle against bovine TB in Sussex whilst Somerset badger cull extended

£1000 per badger

"We estimate that the cull so far has cost around £2 million, including police costs. If they kill around 2000 badgers that works out at about £1000 each - this must be the most expensive cull in history. Vaccinating badgers would be much cheaper.

"Scientifically this policy is a disaster. There was only a slim chance that it could have any benefit whatsoever in reducing TB, but the bungling of the figures has shot that out of the water. Meanwhile, any sense that it was being done in a humane way has been pushed aside in the rush to slaughter badgers, with reports of them being trapped in cages and blasted with shotguns. It's time to end this debacle now and get on with finding a humane and effective way of dealing with bTB."

Sussex Badger Vaccination Project in contrast to Somerset cull

October 2013. Farmers in East Sussex may be pleased to know that they can now choose to have badgers on their land vaccinated against bovine TB following the recent establishment of the Sussex Badger Vaccination Project (SBVP), after five local volunteer passed the Badger Vaccination Training Course run by the Animal Health and Veterinary Laboratories Agency in Gloucestershire.

Somerset cull to be extended?

In the west of England, the government has been carrying out a trial cull of badgers since late August and, if deemed successful, they plan to roll out a badger cull across 40 further areas of England. However the trial in Somerset is about to be extended as they have not managed to cull nearly as many badgers as planned, despite significantly reducing the estimated number of badgers that need to be culled.

Sussex

Part of East Sussex is on the DEFRA "High Risk" list and, as a result, a badger cull could happen in Sussex here as early as June 2014. The Sussex Badger Vaccination Project believes that badger vaccination is a sustainable approach to reducing bTB in wildlife and cattle without the public opposition associated with badger culling.

Kate Edmonds of the Sussex Badger Vaccination Project said "Science has shown that perturbation after culling leads to an increase in bTB on farms. Badger vaccination is the only way to avoid this problem and has been proven to lower bTB infection by 74%. "

"We set up this project to give farmers in East Sussex an extremely low-cost choice to vaccinate rather than to cull. East Sussex is unique in that geographically it's an "island" of bTB, indeed it has a unique strain of the disease, and therefore is ideal as a test case for a combined approach of badger vaccination and changes in cattle husbandry."

Continued