Community
Print
Last week, Brian May argued in his BBC2 documentary on bovine TB (bTB) and the badger cull that badgers were not the cause of reinfection of cow herds and the cull was unjustifiable. Now, the Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board (AHDB) will reportedly make a formal complaint to the BBC claiming that the documentary was biased and inaccurate.
Read more: Brian May Urges UK Government To End ‘Hideous’ Culling Of Badgers
In an earlier statement, AHDB said that Brian May: The Badgers, the Farmers and Me was “missing key evidence that would have helped to inform viewers on the facts about bovine TB.”
It took four years to make the documentary, which followed the Queen guitarist and animal activist’s efforts to understand the bTB crisis. Since 2013, a quarter of a million badgers have been slaughtered in a bid to stop the disease spreading to cows. Around 20,000 infected cows a year are also killed each year. Advocates of the badger cull say it has been effective, but critics say it isn’t supported by the science.
On Wednesday, May responded to accusations of bias in the documentary. In an Instagram post, he explained why focusing on badgers for spreading bTB makes no sense. “There can be no bias in the programme because all ‘sides’ are represented in our team,” he said, which included “one dairy farmer, one farm vet, one wildlife expert and myself, a curious and doggedly persistent scientist.”
A disease of cows, not badgers
The documentary drew on 12 years of research into bTB and the cull at a farm in Devon, concluding that badgers are not the main route of disease transmission. Rather, it’s poor biosecurity and the spreading of slurry (cow manure) on fields where cows end up grazing. Cows become infected through eating the pathogen that’s found in the manure, according to the research. May also finds that government-provided tests for the disease are not very accurate, identifying only about half of infected cows.
Read more: AHDB Relaunches Meat And Dairy Campaign Despite Criticism From Doctors
AHDB claims that before the documentary aired that it “went to some effort to highlight to the BBC the importance of including peer reviewed evidence about how the disease is spread, the positive impact of badger culling on TB in cattle herds and the effectiveness of the current 25-year eradication strategy.” It said that “this was not reflected in the final edit.”
Farmers Weekly reports that the British Cattle Veterinary Association (BCVA), the Countryside Alliance, and NFU Cymru have also “expressed disappointment and concern over the documentary’s portrayal of bovine TB and the badger cull.”
In another article, Malcolm Bennett, a professor of zoonotic and emerging diseases at Nottingham University, told Farmers Weekly that the documentary is generally correct. It’s “central argument that bovine TB is primarily a cattle disease that spreads largely within and between herds, sometimes over long distances through cattle movements, is generally agreed,” he said.
A BBC spokesperson told Plant Based News that the documentary “features numerous voices in the debate on badger culling, including farmers and academics.”
“It follows Sir Brian on his journey over a decade to understand the crisis caused by Bovine Tuberculosis and his opposition to the controversial badger cull,” they added. “The BBC adheres to strict editorial guidelines on impartiality on this matter.”
As an alternative to culling, regional Wildlife Trusts and volunteer groups run badger vaccination programmes. A cow vaccine has also been in the works for years but is still not ready for use. Keir Starmer’s government has described the cull as “ineffective” and pledged to end it, but is still allowing existing cull licenses to continue.
Read more: Campaigners Call for An End To Meat Advertising In The UK
