Cost-Benefit Analysis Model of Badger (Meles Meles) Culling to Reduce Cattle Herd Tuberculosis Breakdowns in Britain, With Particular Reference to Badger Perturbation

Wilkinson, David; Bennett, Richard; McFarlane, I. D.; Rushton, Steve; Shirley, Mark; Smith, Graham C.

doi:10.7589/0090-3558-45.4.1062

Cited by 20 publications

(27 citation statements)

References 16 publications

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“…For instance, culling can increase disease transmission by disrupting social organisation and by increasing animal movements, thus leading to increased contact rates (e.g. Choisy and Rohani 2006;Carter et al 2007;Wilkinson et al 2009). Fertility control is likely to cause less social perturbation than is lethal control (Swinton et al 1997;Tuyttens and Macdonald 1998).…”

Section: Fertility-control Impact On Wildlife Populationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Fertility control to mitigate human–wildlife conflicts: a review

2014

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Abstract. As human populations grow, conflicts with wildlife increase. Concurrently, concerns about the welfare, safety and environmental impacts of conventional lethal methods of wildlife management restrict the options available for conflict mitigation. In parallel, there is increasing interest in using fertility control to manage wildlife. The present review aimed at analysing trends in research on fertility control for wildlife, illustrating developments in fertility-control technologies and delivery methods of fertility-control agents, summarising the conclusions of empirical and theoretical studies of fertility control applied at the population level and offering criteria to guide decisions regarding the suitability of fertility control to mitigate human-wildlife conflicts. The review highlighted a growing interest in fertility control for wildlife, underpinned by increasing numbers of scientific studies. Most current practical applications of fertility control for wild mammals use injectable single-dose immunocontraceptive vaccines mainly aimed at sterilising females, although many of these vaccines are not yet commercially available. One oral avian contraceptive, nicarbazin, is commercially available in some countries. Potential new methods of remote contraceptive delivery include bacterial ghosts, virus-like particles and genetically modified transmissible and non-transmissible organisms, although none of these have yet progressed to field testing. In parallel, new species-specific delivery systems have been developed. The results of population-level studies of fertility control indicated that this approach may increase survival and affect social and spatial behaviour of treated animals, although the effects are species-and context-specific. The present studies suggested that a substantial initial effort is generally required to reduce population growth if fertility control is the sole wildlife management method. However, several empirical and field studies have demonstrated that fertility control, particularly of isolated populations, can be successfully used to limit population growth and reduce human-wildlife conflicts. In parallel, there is growing recognition of the possible synergy between fertility control and disease vaccination to optimise the maintenance of herd immunity in the management of wildlife diseases. The review provides a decision tree that can be used to determine whether fertility control should be employed to resolve specific human-wildlife conflicts. These criteria encompass public consultation, considerations about animal welfare and feasibility, evaluation of population responses, costs and sustainability.

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Section: Fertility-control Impact On Wildlife Populationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Fertility control to mitigate human–wildlife conflicts: a review

2014

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“…), two studies did not address this matter (van Asseldonk and others 2005, Bennett 2009). Three economic analyses (Bernués and others 1997, Wilkinson and others 2009, Mwacalimba and others 2013) only reported negative net present value, regardless of the implemented measures. However, in one of these economic analyses (Wilkinson and others 2009) only benefits arising from the control of the badger population were explored, while in another (Mwacalimba and others 2013), the authors explicitly stated that benefits would have outperformed costs if indirect costs related to human tuberculosis had been taken into account.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 94%

“…Three economic analyses (Bernués and others 1997, Wilkinson and others 2009, Mwacalimba and others 2013) only reported negative net present value, regardless of the implemented measures. However, in one of these economic analyses (Wilkinson and others 2009) only benefits arising from the control of the badger population were explored, while in another (Mwacalimba and others 2013), the authors explicitly stated that benefits would have outperformed costs if indirect costs related to human tuberculosis had been taken into account. However, in one study where a break-even analysis was carried out (Bennett and others 2005), the authors concluded that some strategies could be cost effective, and in two economic evaluations, authors reported that benefits exceeded costs (Perez and others 2011), especially with high disease prevalence and after a time frame longer than 10 years (Smith and others 2007).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 94%

“…After the removal of duplicates (22 abstracts), another 25 articles were excluded on the basis of the abstract. A more complete review of the remaining 19 full text articles revealed that only seven met the eligibility criteria (Bernués and others 1997, van Asseldonk and others 2005, Smith and others 2007, Bennett 2009, Wilkinson and others 2009, Perez and others 2011, Mwacalimba and others 2013). Twelve articles were excluded after the full text screening (Appendix B).…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The reason may lie in the fact that this study was carried out in a developing country (Zambia), where human tuberculosis is still relatively common. On the other hand, in studies carried out in the UK (Bennett and others 2005, Smith and others 2007, Wilkinson and others 2009), only the benefit of reducing bovine TB outbreaks in cattle (ie, the benefit of reducing the number of animals being culled) was estimated, while benefits to human health (eg, treatment costs or averted infirmity-related production losses) or trade (eg, exports, production, country image) were not taken into account. In this case, the reason may lie in the fact that the number of human cases of tuberculosis caused by M bovis is generally low in developed countries, where the actual risk of transmission of bovine TB from cattle to humans remains a controversial issue (Davies 2006).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Control and eradication of tuberculosis in cattle: a systematic review of economic evidence

et al. 2016

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Bovine tuberculosis (TB) is a disease of zoonotic importance for which control and eradication programmes have been carried out in many countries for decades. While the impact of these programmes on public health is still uncertain, the impact on trade is significant because of movement restrictions for animals, costs of testing and culling. The objective of this systematic review was to provide a contribution to the general debate over costs against benefits for the control and eradication of bovine TB in cattle. The search strategy was performed on four electronic databases following the PRISMA (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses) guidelines. The selection process, data abstraction and quality appraisal were carried out according to the Cochrane Collaboration guidelines. The search identified 66 articles out of which eight fulfilled the inclusion criteria. The evidence gathered in this review by combining the conclusions of the most methodologically sound articles supports the idea that, when multiple cost and benefit components are taken into account, efforts to control or eradicate bovine TB may be effective in reducing disease prevalence, economically viable and worth doing.

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Coupling models of cattle and farms with models of badgers for predicting the dynamics of bovine tuberculosis (TB)

Moustakas

Evans

2015

Stoch Environ Res Risk Assess

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Bovine TB is a major problem for the agricultural industry in several countries. TB can be contracted and spread by species other than cattle and this can cause a problem for disease control. In the UK and Ireland, badgers are a recognised reservoir of infection and there has been substantial discussion about potential control strategies. We present a coupling of individual based models of bovine TB in badgers and cattle, which aims to capture the key details of the natural history of the disease and of both species at approximately county scale. The model is spatially explicit it follows a very large number of cattle and badgers on a different grid size for each species and includes also winter housing. We show that the model can replicate the reported dynamics of both cattle and badger populations as well as the increasing prevalence of the disease in cattle. Parameter space used as input in simulations was swept out using Latin hypercube sampling and sensitivity analysis to model outputs was conducted using mixed effect models. By exploring a large and computationally intensive parameter space we show that of the available control strategies it is the frequency of TB testing and whether or not winter housing is practised that have the most significant effects on the number of infected cattle, with the effect of winter housing becoming stronger as farm size increases. Whether badgers were culled or not explained about 5%, while the accuracy of the test employed to detect infected cattle explained less than 3% of the variance in the number of infected cattle.

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Cost-Benefit Analysis Model of Badger (Meles Meles) Culling to Reduce Cattle Herd Tuberculosis Breakdowns in Britain, With Particular Reference to Badger Perturbation

Cited by 20 publications

References 16 publications

Fertility control to mitigate human–wildlife conflicts: a review

Fertility control to mitigate human–wildlife conflicts: a review

Control and eradication of tuberculosis in cattle: a systematic review of economic evidence

Coupling models of cattle and farms with models of badgers for predicting the dynamics of bovine tuberculosis (TB)

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