Bovine TB poses massive threat

27 April 1999

Bovine TB poses massive threat

by Johann Tasker

TUBERCULOSIS in cattle poses a potentially catastrophic threat to the British farming industry, acknowledges a new report by a cross-party committee of MPs.

But the risk to human health is low and there is no call for a BSE-style public panic, concludes the report from the House of Commons Agriculture Select Committee.

“The rising incidence of bovine TB is a serious problem, with implications for public finances, the farming industry and animal welfare,” the report says.

“The consequences to the farming industry if current levels of TB incidence are maintained, or worse continue to increase, clearly warrant the attention now being paid to the issue.”

Farmers Weekly obtained advance copies of the report which was officially published in London this morning (Tuesday).

The report says it is evident that a policy is needed to control bovine TB in cattle on economic and animal welfare grounds.

“It is also clear from the rapid rise of the disease that a solution is needed with some urgency if the problem is not to gain an even greater hold on ever-widening areas of the country,” it says.

Earlier this year, Farmers Weekly reported that bovine TB was being found in areas free from the disease for over forty years.

Those areas included parts of Derbyshire as well as the dairy-farming counties of Shropshire and Cheshire.

“The latest statistics on the increased rate and widening geographical distribution of herd breakdowns are alarming,” says the report.

But the public health risk from bovine TB are “extremely low”, it adds.

“We wish to emphasis that there is no call for public panic on that issue to be re-ignited over bovine TB.”

Tuberculosis in humans is caused by the bacterium M. tuberculosis, a quite distinct species from that responsible for bovine TB.