Governance of strategy for controlling TB is critically important and is very rarely discussed. Unfortunately, badger culling is unpopular with the general public, and as years go by, opposition to it appears to be growing. This is why elected politicians in fear of losing votes tend to favour alternatives. Sadly for TB, government ministers currently set strategy because they are rightly responsible for how money in the public purse is spent.
The AHVLA and universties can only work in areas which are funded and the bulk of these funds come from the public purse via ministers. An illustration of the impact of this process is shown below. See the statement highlighted in red made by Chief Vet Dr Christianne Glossop in conjunction with the u-turn performed by the government minister Alun Davies shown on the right.
As such, although TB is a zoonotic pathogen, the AHVLA and universities are not going to do anything different to what they have been doing since the 70's/80's when I suspect research into practical ways of controlling TB in the UK started to lose focus. The only way these institutions are going to regain focus is if dogs, cats and humans start going down with the disease in numbers. As yet there is no indication that this is happening or ever will. In view of this, I think steps should be taken to take control of strategy out of the hands of ministers. The only way to do this is for the farmer industry as a whole to look at ways of going it alone in certain areas so that the role played by ministers are sidelined in these areas.
One such area is the culling of badgers. A considerable amount of work is needed to develop technology needed to cull badgers both humanely and effectively before wide area roll out may be contemplated. Time to achieve this is likely to require several years. This is one area which has been and is currently receiving very little attention.
Essentially if farmers are not prepared to pay and drive the program, there will be very little effort put into work in areas where progress is most needed.
Are UK farmers going to be eternally snookered by fighting TB in small isolated groups or are they going to start organising themselves as farmers have done in New Zealand to achieve results needed to start turning things around?
Has anyone any views on this?