The Badger Cull: Part 2

    I thought we should kick of our analysis of the debate over badger culling with some general (and sometimes ethical) for and against points I have come up with, followed by the initial scientific papers that started the controversy.

    Many vehemently believe it is ethically wrong to destroy another species just to provide slight aid to our civilisations; fundamentally as this promotes humans as 'more important' than other groups. While I believe this is not true (clearly, given my past posts...), and greatly object to culling of other species just because they are a nuisance, I also believe the farmers that call for badger hunts have a point. We should therefore look at both sides of the argument, if only to be more informed when we come down on one or the other.

Reasons FOR a badger cull:

1. Protecting cattle against TB could increase agricultural productivity; providing lower food prices, and food to more people.
2. Protecting cattle helps protect farmers' livelihoods, as less of their produce is wasted.
3. Bovine TB costs society a huge amount every year; £500m in the last 10 years according to the BBC, decreasing its transmission would save a fair amount of money.

Reasons AGAINST a badger cull:

1. I believe, as do many, that it is unjust to massively harm the survival of another species, just to marginally help our own.
2. Culling methods must be assuredly humane - this seems unlikely to happen, but rather that many individuals will be trapped and left to die.
3. Local badger culls could further spread TB: survivors could migrate, damaging so far unaffected areas, as Sir David Attenborough notes. The Dorset Wildlife Trust also states culls cause disruption and movement between badger groups, resulting in increased numbers of infection of badgers and cattle.
4. To provide any sort of significant reduction in bovine TB, an equally significant number of badgers must be killed.
5. There will be a high monetary cost involved to hunt enough badgers in each area; either the value of a huge number of traps or guns to shoot them.

   One of the first papers to lend scientific evidence to the problem of bovine TB was the Krebs report in 1997. This concluded that badgers are a significant source of TB infection in cattle (although at this point this was mostly unfounded), however at the time the effectiveness of badger culling as a control measure couldn't be quantified. Thus it recommended DEFRA (the governmental department responsible) set up an experiment on culling badgers. 
   The following year the first Bourne report was published by the ISG. They followed the recommendations set out in Krebs (1997), announcing a randomised badger culling trial and research; the results of which would be published in 2007.


   The following scientific papers and reports published on this topic contain information on the literal results and interpretations from test culls. However it appears that each paper published has an opposite discussing contradictory findings! Therefore in part 3 we will look at whether there is significant scientific support that a country-wide badger cull can help reduce bovine TB.