Bovine tuberculosis

Managing Bovine Tuberculosis: Successes and Issues 231

which may in turn drive innovation and cost
savings. However, this requires management
agency capacity for contract specification,
tendering and audit to ensure contractors meet
performance requirements. Direct operational
service delivery by the management agency
itself may offer greater management control,
but may lead to unwanted agency expansion. In
practice, a mix of contracted and direct service
delivery may be appropriate.

15.2.13 Research

While there is an existing large body and litera-
ture of research on TB in cattle (some of which
has been summarized in earlier chapters) fur-
ther research may be required to address local
technical or biological problems, to improve
programme cost-efficacy, or to mitigate adverse
operational or social impacts. Research require-
ments will vary from programme to programme

• often reflecting programme maturity – but will
  likely be directed towards cost-effective applica-
  tions of new diagnostic methods, animal record-
  ing, or control policies within existing TB
  programmes.
  Research planning and delivery processes
  will need to reflect available institutional
  arrangements and structures. A management
  agency may have direct access to research
  capacity, or may need to utilize external capacity
  in institutes or universities. In either case the
  management agency should possess or be able to
  co-opt the expertise needed to identify research
  needs, develop and manage a research portfolio
  to meet these needs, and to oversee the planning
  and delivery of specific research projects. It may
  also need processes to deal with possible conflicts
  of interest between funders and research provid-
  ers, and to ensure intellectual property rights
  and commercial interests are appropriately
  managed. Research projects must be designed to
  ensure delivery of clearly specified outcomes
  under fixed budgets.
  Information derived from analysis of data,
  outcomes of relevant research, feedback from
  farmers and audit findings should be used to
  modify plans, policies and the implementation
  process to ensure these remain best-aligned to
  current programme objectives and are cost

effective (Tweddle and Livingstone, 1994;

Sheridan, 2011; Livingstone et al., 2015b).

15.3 Impact of Wildlife Reservoirs on

Tuberculosis Strategies

The finding of TB in a reservoir or maintenance

wild animal host (Morris and Pfeiffer, 1995;

Palmer, 2013) in high GNI economy countries

may initially be seen as scientifically interesting

or a novel nuisance. Once both the full geo-

graphic distribution of the TB maintenance host

and its impact as a source of infection for cattle

have been determined, then the finding can

range from minor inconvenience to a major set-

back. Where the maintenance host is of limited

distribution, it may have a relatively minor

impact on a TB programme, such as with infec-

tion of white-tailed deer in Michigan in the USA

(Palmer, 2013) and in elk and white-tailed deer

in Canada (O’Brien et al., 2011). However, where

a maintenance host has a wide distribution and

is an effective vector of infection for cattle, such

as with badgers in the UK and Republic of Ire-

land (Abernethy et al., 2006; More and Good,

2006; Wilson et al., 2011), wild boar in Spain

(Naranjo et al., 2008) and possums in New Zea-

land (Nugent et al., 2015a) this greatly increases

both cost and time frames required to achieve TB

freedom or eradication goals.

The presence of a significant wildlife main-

tenance host introduces ecological, environ-

mental and possibly societal factors that extend

beyond the immediate farming environment.

These factors may vary greatly from situation to

situation, and will require locally designed

responses. Altogether, these will be more chal-

lenging and complex than the largely standard

test, slaughter and quarantine processes that

are sufficient for effective control where the dis-

ease is limited to farmed cattle. Controlling TB in

wildlife requires different sets of knowledge and

analysis of much more complex situations. A

programme that requires disease management

in wildlife as well as cattle is likely to impact on

people who may have little interest in cattle TB

control, whereas cattle farmers and TB control

stakeholders may have little interest in wildlife

management. This can lead to conflict based on

differing attitudes towards controlling livestock