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<p>Bovine TB (bTB) is one of the most difficult and intractable animal health challenges
that England faces today. Tackling the reservoir of infection in wildlife, chiefly
badgers, is an important element of Defra's bTB eradication strategy for England.
Earlier this year, we published our response to the Godfray Review, which sets out
the next phase of our strategy to combat bTB. Our response noted that while it is
important to retain the ability to introduce new cull zones where epidemiological
evidence points to a reservoir of disease in badgers, we envisage that any remaining
areas would join the current cull programme in the next few years and that the badger
cull phase of the strategy would then wind down by the mid to late 2020s. Culling
would, however, remain an option thereafter where epidemiological assessment indicates
that it is needed.</p><p> </p><p>That plan to wind down the current badger culling
programme has not changed. As noted in the Government response to the Godfray Review,
it is unrealistic to switch immediately to badger vaccination but we are already doing
a great deal to make sure the transition happens. In July, we announced that world-leading
bTB cattle vaccination trials are set to get underway in England and Wales as a result
of a major breakthrough by government scientists. These trials enable work to accelerate
towards planned deployment of a cattle vaccine by 2025.</p>
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