Having had one reactor at last week’s TB test we’re now facing a minimum of two further 60-day TB tests and the countdown is on again. The test was the first one we’d had since our six-month check test where we lost three cows and our dear old bull Ernie.
Every TB test is hard work and is incredibly stressful. Getting the cattle in and making sure they all safely go through the crush is very physically demanding work. I had a good team of people working with me on the latest test which made things easier but no matter how smoothly things run you’re still very nervous waiting for the results.
Although we had one reactor I have to be positive and look at the overall result of the test as a good one because I wasn’t sure how many animals I was going to lose. You try to remain optimistic but, having lost up to 30 cattle in a test before, you are never certain. Losing any cow you’ve bred and raised is sad but the test result does mean I can continue with the business in its current form.
Now it’s time to get back to doing the rest of the day-to-day work on the farm as summer rolls on. But the thought of the next test will always be at the back of my mind.
Farmer David Barton 
This permaculture link is one of the most thoughtful provoking articles I have ever seen on the bovine TB. Tim Green has done a very good job. He says this…
“You may recognise this as natural selection, an ongoing process by which continued exposure to diseases and pathogens creates a population largely capable of surviving such things. This is sometimes referred to as “survival of the fittest”. In contrast, the current official “test and cull” policy to deal with bovine TB in the UK has been most aptly described as “survival of the shittest”. This is the process by which we slaughter any cow that shows signs of mounting an immune response to the TB pathogen, thus steadily removing those animals from the population that had the best chance of surviving infection.”
So basically Tim Green is saying that a TB reactor cow is reacting to this test because it is healthy, because its immune system is doing what an immune system should do. I suggest that we place the reactor cows in quarantine for a period of time, maybe few months or more, and then retest them and see if they still react. They may or they may not, but we can be sure of one thing, the cow will be very healthy. Basically, we don’t really know why a cow is reacting to these tests, the problem isn’t the animal, it’s the human who then translates a so-called ‘positive’ test into infectious disease, but the cow isn’t sick and that is a big problem with this issue – we slaughter healthy cattle! Now that sounds like madness and totally self-destructive, but this is the state of British farming. Farmers need to wake up from their deep infectious sleep and science needs to stop testing until they know the mode of transmission. Being as we have had sixty years of cutting edge science and still unable to ascertain the mode of transmission, as Professor Macdonald has stated in ‘The State of British Mammals’ report, then we cannot assume infection as this is nothing more than a giant leap in faith. It is very shoddy science.
However, another angle on TB is that it is not even infectious – see my article on Rochdale Online titled ‘TB Not Infectious’.
Badger Cull – TB not Infectious
http://www.rochdaleonline.co.uk/news-features/129/letters-to-the-editor/88509/badger-cull-tb-not-infectious
Let’s not forget that the slaughtered cattle and badgers are all healthy animals. It is insane to slaughter healthy animals. So we must look exactly at what TB testing is picking up and stop translating into infection. As soon as we translate, based on an infectious theory, and it remains a theory, then we are lost. Here is a link to Tim Green’s article. John Wantling, Rochdale, UK
Bovine TB, Badgers and a Permaculture Perspective
http://www.permaculture.co.uk/articles/1608111008/bovine-tb-badgers-and-permaculture-perspective
I hear what you are saying, if there is one thing I have learnt about bTb it’s never as straight forward as you think or would like it to be.
I would agree some cattle going to slaughter because they have failed the skin test could be cattle that are building natural immunity to bTb. However some cattle that fail the skin test do have bTb but it is not until post mortem that we know that.
We also know that badgers carry and transmit bTb and also die from bTb, in what must be the most horrendous death.
We must do all that is necessary to get this disease under control with a matter of urgency , once we have achieved that we must look how to keep it that way.
Remember in the mid 1980”s we had this disease under control in the UK we must get that status back using all methods available to us.
David, I have left a few comments on the link below which will answer your response to my TB Not Infectious comment above. I do not think that you hear what I am saying. The problem is that your cattle are healthy, they are not sick, so why do you state that you must control this ‘disease’ when your animals are not even diseased. All we have is a test result that is ‘positive’ but the scientific translation of this test result is based on infection, but the reality is that Professor Macdonald has stated quite clearly that we dont know the mode of transmission after 60 years of cutting edge science. If we dont know the mode of transmission and your cows are healthy, then you have to question that test because the translation of that test is the problem, not your cattle because they are healthy. This is merely rational thinking. You say that badgers transmit TB but as Professor Macdonald states, we dont know the mode of transmission. As a consequence, you cannot possibly state that badgers transmit anything. You must first of all discover the mode of transmission, but I have emailed Professor Macdonald and the Warwick University academics who also propagate infection and I have pointed out that their research is so deeply flawed it is a disgrace and a fraud. All you are doing is jumping on the infectious bandwagon and that is understandable but it is also a fatal error not only for yourself in financial and emotional terms, but also for your healthy cattle that are being slaughtered when there is nothing wrong with them. Your belief that bovine Tb was controlled in the 1980s does not make sense if it is not even infectious. I would not use this belief to justify the science which is so clearly flawed. John Wantling, Rochdale, UK
160 farmers meet to discuss how to keep TB out of Cumbria
http://www.farmersguardian.com/home/hot-topics/bovine-tb/160-farmers-meet-to-discuss-how-to-keep-tb-out-of-cumbria/65903.article#commentsubmitted
John I will reply fully, but we are flat out harvesting just now. I do appreciate your comments and would like to take time to look at it in more depth. Thanks David
John, I have discussed your comments with my vet who I have the highest regard for, he tells me Btb is infectious not very infectious but infectious and animals can be infectious for short periods of time, they can also carry the disease it may not develop in them but they can still be infectious.
Badgers can carry large amounts of bTB in their urine faeces and sputum, I think to try to argue this is not the case only puts us backwards in trying to get on top of the problem.
This is a very complicated disease and I’m sure my answers won’t satisfy you as a simple answer cannot.
I do however thank you for bringing this to my attention and I do agree with you on the fact that we are culling the cattle that potentially have natural immunity to bTB but how do we know which are which and so it goes on , answer one question on bTB and it generates two more ! It’s back to harvest for me if weather permits.
David, your vet may well believe that bovine Tb is infectious but tell your vet about Professor Macdonald who states in his report titled ‘The State of British Mammals’ that we don’t yet know the mode of transmission after sixty years of cutting edge science. As a consequence, your vet cannot possibly state that bovine TB is infectious until we can ascertain the mode of transmission. That is not my opinion, it is a concrete fact, and so if your vet believes in infection, then point him into the general direction of Professor Macdonald’s report. You have to understand that this idea of infection is deeply entrenched within the human psyche, something like flu or polio or aids or measles being infectious. The reality is that disease is an inside-out phenomenon, not outside-in (unless it is a poison or a physical trauma), and so we must be very careful when we assume anything that good science cannot verify. I am not a scientist but I would guess that a bovine TB test is based on the presence of certain proteins or antibodies, but please correct me if I am wrong. Because we associate certain proteins with TB, then we assume that the presence of these proteins means infection, meaning something that is exogenous or having an external cause. This thinking, which is a theory, is the cornerstone of infectious disease. But is this true? Do we expel ‘flu virus’ or ‘measles virus’ and then ‘catch’ that disease. This seems like an out-of-this-world theory because we should all know that disease is an inside-out phenomenon, meaning that we don’t ‘catch’ anything. When we suffer from a disease, we generally manifest symptoms especially when it is leaving the body, such as a rash in measles or a high temperature, for example. The problem in ‘catching’ a disease especially concerning cattle is that we don’t even have a disease because your cattle are healthy. We don’t have a disease rampaging through the countryside, all we have is a test result and a human translation of what that means and that translation is based on infection. Infection is only a theory, it is not a reality. If it was a reality, then your cows would be sick, but they are not sick assuming that you care for them properly. So a test result doesn’t mean a sick animal, so why slaughter healthy cattle. That is madness and this is why science must first or all cease testing completely, then discover what these tests are picking up, because as Tim Green has stated, it might be that a positive test result is good news, not bad news, and so a cause to celebrate. But you see, the Warwick University academics are paid a salary and that means that they have to translate disease into infection as otherwise they would be ousted from the campus and out of a job. When your salary is dependent on a lie, then there is a tendency to tell that lie. Their research isn’t pure and untainted, it is based on infection because their salary is dependent on the infectious industry and that mean government funding aplenty. When government make a decision, it is based on infection because the main issue is funding, and the industry demand funding. It is the politician’s job to protect the industry because they are the industry, so they are prepared to lie their heads off until the cows come home. Once that funding has been approved, then mission accomplished! When I emailed these academics, they did not respond with a thank you, and that they would do research on none-infectious Tb. They threw it in the waste bin because it was a threat to their livelihood. This is what happens, they sell their souls and so the infectious theory continues on. Sadly, most folk merely accept infection on face value because it’s down to consensus, if we repeat something often enough, then it must be right, even though it is wrong. John Wantling, Rochdale, UK
David, I have pointed out in my Rochdale Online article that we sent a third of a million US people to the grave in the 1980/90s through an infectious theory followed by industrial, government and media propaganda. This was the so-called war on aids, but once again it was the exact same recipe as in bovine TB, the main issue was government funding, and everyone wanted a bit of that. The fact that the so-called ‘aids virus’ was a mere theory propagated by Robert Gallo – a government scientist, a puppet on a string – made no difference. There was an explosion of government propaganda and the media had a field day. Everyone apart from the HEAL groups and the like were bought off and so this was a case of consensus, repeating something endlessly to condition that idea of infection into the mass population to justify government funding. It was similar to a war and it was all about human greed. I suggest that bovine TB is very similar to that because as with aids, the jigsaw does not come together. The difference was that aids began as a degenerate disease in those living a ‘fast track’ lifestyle where in bovine Tb, there is no disease. All we have is a translation of a so-called ‘positive’ test result and then an assumption that the animal is sick even though it isn’t sick. Government funding is dependent on that translation into infection, but as we don’t know the mode of transmission, there is a part of the jigsaw missing. Unless that jigsaw is complete, then we should not base this theory on the mass slaughter of animals. But this is what we do because we all play our part in accepting the flawed theory of infection. We have medical libraries full to the brim of ‘hiv’ science and millions of reference papers but the reality is that we don’t have an ‘hiv’ test able to detect ‘hiv’ and this is stated on the manufacturers package insert for legal reasons. But you tell that to a Warwick University ‘hiv’ researcher, and he/she will laugh in your face because to place doubt on that would see his job and reputation going down the drain. So it has happened before and the germ industry will do it again as people and animals are of no value to them and neither is the farmer who has been caught up in this infectious net. You take a meticulous scientist and give him a ‘positive’ TB test result and the first thing he will do is ask what that test is picking up. But we don’t ask questions like that anymore because we have already made our infectious minds up; the translation into infectious disease has been rubber-stamped because this is the source of government funding. Farmers should be outraged by this shoddy science and shoddy government, but sadly, there is no dissident movement in the farming community and that is your downfall. I will update my Rochdale Online article in the near future and then I will leave this issue alone as I cannot do any more. I think that this conversation is now at an end but I think that I have clearly explained this issue as best as I am able. John Wantling, Rochdale UK
Hi John, I just want to concentrate on bTB that alone is enough for me, it’s a very complex disease. You have to look at it in the whole and the way in which we are trying to control / reduce bTB is not at all simple many things must come together a lot of it is not perfect but we have to do the best we possible can . With what we have
I think your views on infection and things being infectious are somewhat controversial, I am glad you brought it up, I have looked at it and I am satisfied that bTB is infectious. We must agree to disagree. I do thank you for your comments
David, yes, you are perfectly right, my views are controversial but as I say, disease is an inside-out phenomenon, not outside-in unless it is a trauma or poisoning. The infectious theory is only a theory but an industry has been built on that theory regardless that it is wrong. In the war on aids, the science establishment turned science upside-down to accommodate the infectious theory and it never made any sense at all. Bad medicine is the product of bad science and so is it any wonder when we send a third of a million people to the grave because of infectious thinking. But as I say, you cannot talk about infection if you do not have the mode of transmission. That is common sense, surely it is. If we don’t have the mode of transmission, we are then guessing or assuming. Scientific theory based on an assumption is not science unless the theory blends into reality – the theory has to manifest in reality. Because your cattle are healthy, then infectious bovine TB is not a reality, it is a theory that does not blend into the reality. This is rational thinking, it is nothing more. However, I do realise that it is easy to be conditioned to think in a certain way, regardless that this way is not a reality. This is common and with respect, you have fallen down this infectious hole but so has your vet and so has the Warwick University academics and so has the anti-badger cull groups and protesters and even David Attenborough, Brian May and Dominic Dyer of the Badger Trust. They have all jumped on the infectious bandwagon and are trying to address the issue based on that, but as there is no bovine Tb disease, as your cows are not sick, then this is all an empty theory, and so it’s the wrong way of thinking. This is irrational, and although I may be considered controversial, my thinking is based on rational thought even though it is hard to take in because it goes against the way that we have been conditioned. I’m afraid that we are talking about the power of the industry and the power of the politics that influence the way that we think and what we believe. Jumping on the infectious bandwagon is merely that, it is jumping on a train of thought without thinking what we are doing. This goes on in all the universities when it concerns the feeding of an industry ($$$) and I think that this is clear to see. I have made my case and addressed ‘bovine Tb’ and made it clear that there isn’t an infectious disease making cattle and badgers sick, and I cannot do anything more. All we have is a test result and a human translation based on infection, but we don’t have infection and we don’t have diseased animals. It is a big problem when we think like this because we are then in a fantasy world based on theory, not reality. Sadly, the consequence of living in that fantasy world is we slaughter healthy cattle and healthy badgers. I suggest that we throw away all the testing kits and forget all about infectious disease. Your beautiful animals will be happy, your beautiful badgers will be happy and you will be happy. But the industry will not be happy because the government will no longer be able to justify funding which is what this issue is all about. It’s about human greed and the corruption of science and the corruption of human thought and consensus reality. You go ask the Warwick University academics to do research on that and they will throw that idea down the drain as they base their research on infection because they are paid by the infectious industry. It’s an infectious business, I am afraid to say, and not a pretty picture. John Wantling, Rochdale, UK
http://bovinetb.blogspot.co.uk/2013/10/approach-with-caution.html
Healthy lungs or infected ones?