Blue Campaigners Badger Government
By Kent Barker (with apologies to Kenneth
Grahame)
I must have been dreaming, for
winter had come early and I was lost in the Wild Wood with a thick blanket of
snow covering all about. I was fearful, not just at being unable to find my way
home, but with an inchoate anxiety over the path we, as a society, were following.
I stumbled in the snow barking my
shin. On close inspection, I discovered a boot scraper. Ah, thought I, where
there is a boot scraper there is likely to be a door. And so it transpired. A
low wooden affair giving access, apparently, into the side of the hill. I
knocked loudly, begging succour.
It was dark in the hallway when the
door opened and I could not properly see the figure that beckoned me forth
until we entered a small parlour with a fire crackling in the grate and candles
in sconces round the walls. So, imagine my surprise when he threw off his cloak
to reveal a long furry face with a white stripe up the centre of his muzzle,
twitching whiskers and sharp bright eyes. But the most singular aspect of his
appearance was a blue velvet smoking jacket with a Conservative Party rosette
on the lapel.
Having made me welcome with a plate
of cold meats and a glass of port, he took up a copy of The Telegraph and pointed to an article whose headline proclaimed
‘Badger Cull to be extended to Dorset’. “Shocking”, muttered my host. “I have
friends and relatives there. Whatever will become of them? And after one
thousand eight hundred and sixty-one senseless deaths in Somerset and Gloucestershire two years ago. What
is the world coming to?”
Perhaps made argumentative by the
port wine, I ventured an opinion that, sad though this undoubtedly was, 260,817
cattle had been slaughtered since 2008, having in all likelihood contracted bovine
TB from members of his species, and this placed an intolerable burden on dairy
famers.
My furry friend rose to his full
height (which it must be allowed was not great) and proclaimed vehemently:
“There is absolutely no evidence, no evidence whatsoever, that bovine TB is
caused by TB among badgers. It’s even possible that my friends the fallow deer
could be responsible. And, anyway, what is all the fuss about? An independent
survey commissioned by the Government’s own Department for Rural Affairs
concluded that ‘bTB control in cattle is irrelevant as
a public health policy. In the UK, cattle-to-human transmission is negligible.
Aerosol transmission—the only probable route of human acquisition—occurs at
inconsequential levels when milk is pasteurized…Furthermore, there is little
evidence for a positive cost benefit in terms of animal health of bTB control.
Such evidence is required; otherwise, there is little justification for the
large sums of public money spent on bTB control in the UK.’ That’s the Government’s
own independent analysis!”
He sat back in his armchair and put
his kerchief to his face. I could not tell if it was to mop his brow or to wipe
away a tear. “Surely”, I ventured, “something must be done for the poor cattle.
They, after all, are fellow creatures too.”
“Yes, of course I grieve for them. But,
don’t you see, their deaths are as senseless as those of my kind. Cattle no
more need to be culled than do badgers. Infected cattle have little probability
of developing the disease and seldom show symptoms during their (often short)
economic lives. Bovine TB can remain dormant in an animal for many years, or
indefinitely. If an animal reacts to the skin test this does not mean that it
will go on to develop symptoms, be infectious, or become ill. And if you really
want to stamp out bovine TB, then vaccinate against it. If you really want to
attempt to prevent TB in badgers, vaccinate against it. Do you know that not
one of my eighteen hundred murdered friends in the last ‘cull’ (what a horrible
word) was even tested to see if they carried the disease!”
We sat in silence for a few moments before
I pointed to his rosette and asked how, given his views, he could support a
government that was undertaking such slaughter?
“Ah, well, I’m a member of the Blue
Badger Campaign—it’s an offshoot of Conservative Animal Welfare. There’s also a
Blue Fox group. We’ve got to combat the farming lobby and change opinion in
government.
Perhaps the brandy wine fuddled my
brain, but I cannot recall how I got home that night. I just remember waking in
my own bed clutching a piece of paper from the Independent Scientific Group on Cattle TB which read: “Culling can
make no meaningful contribution to cattle TB control in Britain.” Could it be
it was not a dream after all?
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