BADGERS, IS CULLING THE ONLY WAY?

Badger (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

                                  CAN WE VACCINATE?                                                                                                  As you may or not know 27th august started as the ist day of badger culling in 2 counties of the UK. Around 5,000 badgers are expected to be killed in Gloucestershire and Somerset over the next six weeks under two pilot schemes.The controversial badger cull has started as experts insist it is a vital move to stop the spread of bovine TB.cattle tuberculosis is a highly infectious respiratory infection that has very similar effects to human TB. The disease mainly affects lungs and kidneys, causing infected animals to lose weight and experience breathing problems. They become emaciated, weak, lethargic and eventually die. Before milk was pasteurised, cattle TB was common in humans - and often fatal. It is rarer now. Badgers pass the disease to one another then it is passed on to farm animals,  Cattle are the main hosts, but it does affect many other mammals, including badgers, deer, goats, pigs, llamas and alpacas, dogs and cats.
Those carrying out the cull have been set a target of reducing the local badger population by 70% which, previous culls suggest, could reduce cattle in TB by at least 16% over the long term.
The policy is in marked contrast to the one pursued by the Welsh government, which has just embarked on the second year of a badger vaccination programme in a disease hotspot in north Pembrokeshire. Vaccination has been proved in studies to have an impact on the spread of TB amongst badgers..
The vaccine is obviously looking to protect clean animals, but it also reduces the bacilli that is excreted by infected badgers. It doesn't cure them, but it reduces the possibility of any further infection.
No vaccine is 100% effective but we're talking in the region of a 75% level of protection.
When that size of the population is being protected then the chances of picking up the disease are very slim.
The life span of a badger is about five years.
So if you continue the vaccination project for five years, then the majority of animals that were there at the beginning will have died out and that vaccination programme is leading towards a clean and healthy badger population.,                                                                                                                                                         Are you a "culler" or a "vaccinator",         Let me know in your comments please, and dont forget the " reaction " boxes,       Regards A+A

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