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Knepp Estate, longhorn herd  read more...read more...
A dairy farmer has been fined for chaotic record keeping that may have contributed to the spread of bovine tuberculosis on his premises.  read more...read more...
A young lad is forced to slaughter his pet cow because of the current bovine TB policy.  read more...read more...
A 33 year old farmer and father of two in Shrophsire was killed by a bull as he tested cattle for bTB. He was conducting routine bTB testing on cows at Ashwood Farm in Whitchurch on 3 December 2013 when he was fatally injured by a bull  read more...read more...
There is such a focus on badgers that the fact that bovine TB is a cattle based problem has been set on one side. History has shown us that the incidence of TB in cattle can be brought down to a very low level by cattle based measures alone. Add to this the vaccination of badgers in hot spot areas and even their implication can be dealt with.  read more...read more...
Looking at some of the anti cull websites and having kept a close eye on media reports during the trial culls that have recently finished in Gloucestershire and Somerset, it would seem that if the culling is rolled out into other areas the level of opposition is not going to get less and could even worsen, meaning that policing costs alone (paid for from public funds) are going to be exorbitant.  read more...read more...
This article is a summary of the significant legal proceedings relating to incidents re cattle and bovine TB.  read more...read more...
In this well researched article by Mike Rendle he poses this question: 'Are badger infections following, not leading, bovine TB infections in cattle? ' and discovers some very interesting facts about cattle, badgers and bovine TB.  read more...read more...
Bovine TB - the views of a farmer based on field-based observations over many years. Peter Aspin was a herdsman, then a dairy farmer. He is now a beef farmer and also has a contract rearing dairy heifers for a local farmer. He was conventional and is now organic. He also run the Shropshire Agroforestry Project. All on 40 acres. To understand bovine TB one must first understand how significantly livestock husbandry practices have changed in recent years. I was on a dairy farm a couple of years ago - a closed herd (one that reared all its own replacement youngstock) - which had had its first bTB breakdown. Two veterinarians had arrived to do the follow-up sixty day retest. Talking to them I asked what they thought was the source of the problem. Their immediate response was that the adjacent dairy farm had purchased imported cattle the previous year, this herd had subsequently developed bTB and passed the infection either directly or via a vector to the neighbouring herd. Whether the imported cattle were themselves carriers of bTB or whether they had no immunity, I do not know and I assumed the vets did not know but the issue of cattle importation is a major concern for both farmers and vets. Ever increasing numbers of dairy cattle are being imported simply because they are cheaper if large enough numbers are purchased. I know of a herd of over two thousand dairy cows where not a single replacement animal is home-reared, every single one arrives on a lorry from mainland Europe.  read more...read more...
Dairy farm worker, Steve Jones, is not happy about the future of the dairy industry, or the current policy to cull badgers. The industry has many problems. Bovine tuberculosis is just one.'The cattle industry is long overdue for reform', he says. Here he sets out his comments.  read more...read more...

Skin test fails – good examples of anergic cows

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Back in April 2008 a Friesian cow with chronic mastitis was reported as a possible source of TB infection to three calves which were positive to the skin test. Whilst the dairy herd had confirmed disease, this cow had passed 11 TB skin tests since 2003. In February 2008 the three calves sucking milk from her were positive to the TB skin test, but they did not have visible lesions at post-mortem examination. The cow passed the skin test. In April 2008, the next three calves (three months old) which were sucking from her also reacted positively to the TB test, but this time one of them had visible lesions at post-mortem. The cow again passed a skin test. The housing conditions of these calves made contact with wildlife extremely difficult, and the three calves only sucked milk from the suspect cow so badgers were not implicated.

Permission was sought from the cow’s owner to carry out a gIFN blood test, in order to find out if the cow was the source of infection of TB to the calves (and maybe to the rest of the dairy herd) as it was suspected that the cow might be an anergic animal. Both gIFN test and a Rapid Antibody test were positive.

In view of the results, the animal was slaughtered. The carcass was condemned because of the amount of TB lesions found (generalised TB). Visible lesions were found in the head nodes, broncho-mediastinal nodes, mesenteric nodes, supramammary glands, udder tissue and liver. All lesions found were typical of TB. Samples of lesioned material were submitted for mycobacterial culture to the VLA in June, and were returned as positive for M. bovis spoligotype 17 (SB0263 from “http://www.Mbovis.org” www.Mbovis.org). This spoligotype was within its geographical home range, and therefore not unusual for the area of this breakdown.

Also of interest, with similar cases is this paper, ‘Outbreak of bovine tuberculosis featuring anergy to the skin test, udder lesions and milkborne disease in young calves’ by M. G. Houlihan, MVB, MSc, MRCVS1, F. W. Dixon, BVM&S, MRCVS2 and N. A. Page, BVSc, MRCVS2 (http://veterinaryrecord.bmj.com/content/163/12/357.abstract):

Abstract.

A severe outbreak of bovine tuberculosis in a 1300-head, multisite dairy herd in Great Britain had several unusual features, including anergy to the tuberculin skin test, milkborne disease in calves and a farm cat, and a risk of human infection. The outbreak was controlled by culling 221 cattle over 15 months, by using the γ-interferon (γ-IFN) test and by the examination of milk samples. The γ-IFN test detected infected animals that were not detected by the skin test.

Information extracted from Animal Health’s ‘Official Veterinarian Newsletter”, Issue 2, November 2008 - see http://animalhealth.defra.gov.uk/about/publications/ov/ov-newsletter/OV_newsletter_2.pdf

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