Date published: 2008/07/07
The BBC says:
The government will not issue licences to cull badgers to prevent cattle TB in England, Hilary Benn has confirmed.
In a Commons statement, the environment secretary said that while a large-scale cull could improve the situation, it could also make the problem worse.
The National Farmers' Union (NFU) is taking legal advice on the decision, details of which were obtained by BBC News on Friday.
About 4,000 herds were affected by the disease last year.
These were mainly localised to the south-west of England.
Rather than culling, vaccination will form a cornerstone of bovine TB policy, and the government is to invest £20m into research.
The government based its decision on advice from the Independent Scientific Group which it established to review research on the issue.
The ISG concluded that culling would not be an economic solution to the problem, as did the Environment and Rural Affairs select committee.
A subsequent analysis led by the government's former chief scientific advisor Sir David King came down in favour of culling.
...
Mr Benn indicated his belief that vaccination - either of badgers or cattle or both - should be an effective strategy as soon as vaccines can be developed.
The correct decision, although it is unbelievable how much time and effort has been wasted (and will continue to be wasted) on this decision making when much more time and effort should have been spent on actually developing vaccines.
_________________________________________________________
All material not included from other sources is copyright cambridge2000.com.
For further information or questions email: info [at] cambridge2000 [dot] com
(replace "[at]" with "@" and "[dot]" with ".").