THE NUMBER of Irish cattle failing the mandatory test for Bovine TB has continued to fall, figures from the Department of Agriculture have shown.
Figures for the first quarter of this year show a fall in the number of “reactors”, that is cattle who fail the test for the disease.
By the end of March, 14,500 of the country’s herds had been tested and over 1.2 million tests had been carried out.
The tests uncovered 3,149 reactor animals compared with 4,059 in the same period in 2009, although more than 3,000 more herds had been tested that year.
The figures showed there were 2,228 herds restricted in the country on that date compared with 2,432 in 2009.
Experts believe they can build on the progress made last year when there was a continuing decline in the numbers.
Totals for last year showed there were 23,805 reactor animals removed from the national herd, when nearly nine million tests were carried out.
This reduced the incidence of reactors per 1,000 animals tested to 2.26.
In the previous year, over nine million tests were conducted and this found a total of 29,901 animals, or a rate of 3.25 reactors per 1,000 tests.
Experts in the department are expecting there will be fewer than 20,000 reactors found by the test by the end of the year.
It is currently conducting a major programme on the vaccination of badgers, which are known to be a major factor in the spread of the disease.
This programme, which will see badgers being vaccinated in areas where the incidence of TB in cattle is low, could lead in a few years to a national programme where all badgers in the country are vaccinated against the disease.