Every year, around forty thousand cases of Bovine Tuberculosis are recorded in the UK.  Over the last twenty years, the number of cases has increased.  Wales and the South-west are particularly badly affected by the disease.  To find out more about the problem faced by many farmers, I spoke to Mark Chilcott, who has an arable and livestock farm in the Dorchester area.   I asked him about it and he said: "TB in cattle is an ongoing struggle for livestock farmers in the UK."

Asked whether it is hard to contain, he said: "Yes, because firstly, there is a very long time between infection and any clinical sign of the disease; secondly, the skin test that is used does not pick up all of the infected animals; and thirdly, no effective vaccine has been approved yet.  This means that it has been very difficult to eradicate."

He then explained how it affected farmers: "Firstly, the affected animals have to be isolated to prevent further infection, and then have to go to slaughter.  Some compensation is given for the slaughtered animal, but this does not always reflect the true value of the animal or the value of its lost production i.e. milk.  Also, the farm is placed under animal movement restrictions, which makes it very difficult to buy and sell stock.  The other implication is that the whole herd has to be tested every sixty days until two clear tests are recorded.  This usually means many months of added workload and stress to both staff and animals." 

While the stringent laws to contain bovine tuberculosis continue to have their impacts on both farmers and animals, it seems that, thanks to them, the number of infections has reduced slightly in the last few years.  However, it still remains a serious threat to livestock farmers all over the country.  Though there is hope.  Recently, breakthroughs in PCR testing and whole Genome sequencing of the disease causing bacteria will help the accuracy of the diagnosis and tracing of the disease.