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.
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.
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.
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.