Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what estimate his Department makes of how many (a) badgers and (b) cattle have been vaccinated against Bovine TB since the Government announced the phased end of badger culling in May 2021.

The Government announced the next phase of its strategy to combat bovine tuberculosis in England, including the phasing out of badger culling, on 27 May 2021. Since then, 1,410 badgers have been vaccinated across England. Further details on the numbers of badgers vaccinated will be published on gov.uk in due course.

To date, vaccination of cattle in the UK against bovine TB has been carried out only as part of research studies. The candidate cattle vaccine and skin test to detect infected animals among vaccinated animals (normally referred to as a DIVA test) are the subject of field trials led by the Animal and Plant Health Agency, which started in June 2021. These trials are aimed at securing UK marketing authorisations for the candidate cattle vaccine and DIVA skin test.