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

To ask His Majesty's Government whether data shows that transmission of bovine tuberculosis is higher (1) from badgers to cattle, or (2) between cattle.

Several recent studies using whole genome sequencing data from Mycobacterium bovis isolates in cattle and badgers estimate that, in the UK, transmission of the bacterium occurs more frequently within the same host species (i.e. from cattle to cattle and from badger to badger), than between badgers and cattle. However, the relative rates of transmission between and within the two maintenance host species are not uniform across the country and can vary over time.

Even so, there is broad scientific consensus that badgers are implicated in the spread of TB to cattle. Professor Sir Charles Godfray’s independent review of the science published in 2018, which brought together leading UK experts, concluded that TB spreads within and between populations of badgers and cattle and that spread from badgers to cattle is an important cause of herd breakdowns in high-incidence areas.