The widespread slaughter of badgers is understandably an emotive issue – one that is currently being debated up and down the country.

A trial cull of these iconic native animals is already underway in Somerset and Gloucestershire. The official stance from the Government is that a widespread cull is needed to reduce TB in cattle. Unfortunately for badgers they can carry bovine tuberculosis.

The areas currently involved in the trial are hot spots for the infectious disease. But bovine TB affects many other parts of the country, including to a lesser extent our own West Yorkshire.

It might seem a straightforward matter. Badgers get TB and cattle get TB. Kill one species to protect another.

But the situation is much more complex.

Bovine TB is caused by a bacterium that can also infect badgers, deer and other mammals. In this country cattle are routinely tested for the disease and destroyed if they test positive. It is similar to the human form of TB and while people can catch it from contact with infected cattle or eating and drinking unpasteurised dairy products, this is a rare occurrence.

In fact, according to the UK’s Health Protection Agency, there have been only 33 cases a year of bovine TB in humans over the past decade. It is more common in countries where milk is unpasteurised. The risk of contracting the disease by eating meat from an infected animal is also extremely low.

Although the disease in cattle can be treated with antibiotics this would prove to be uneconomical as the animals could not be used for milk or meat during treatment and yet farmers would still have to feed them as well as pay for the drug regime.

In 2012 nearly 28,300 cattle in England were slaughtered after testing positive for TB and the Government paid out �34m in compensation to farmers. The numbers of cattle destroyed has remained fairly stable in the past five years.

Fortunately, West Yorkshire has a low incidence of bovine TB – latest figures from DEFRA show that just 11 herds in the county were under disease restrictions in June this year, which means that an infected individual had been identified. In the worst areas hundreds of herds are affected.

The National Farmers’ Union says bovine TB causes hardship and distress to its members who witness, in some cases, the total loss of their herds.

NFU president Peter Kendall has welcomed the badger cull and says his members “have suffered the misery of dealing with TB on farms for some decades. But now we feel that something is finally being done to stem the cycle of infection between cattle and badgers.”

Honley-based NFU group secretary Robert Nobles agrees that farmers feel the cull has to take place.

“The farmers don’t want the destruction of wild animals, but most other methods have been tried,” he explained.

“There is a massive impact on the farmers of the herds that are under movement restrictions. They can’t sell their animals but they still have to feed them.”

While no-one doubts the tragic and damaging consequences of bovine TB the real debate is over how best to control its spread.

Rachael Anderson, from the Kirklees Badger Protection Group (KBPG), says the answer to the problem is to vaccinate cattle and put in place stricter controls over the movement of animals. This would require changes in EU law, which prohibits vaccination as the vaccine interferes with the TB test – making it difficult to tell the difference between a vaccinated animal and one that tests positive for TB.

The KBPG points to evidence gathered from a previous major study – the Randomised Badger Culling Trial – that took place over a decade from 1997 and cost the Government �50m.

“The conclusion was that the rigorous culling of badgers can make no meaningful impact on TB,” said Rachael. “The trial reduced the disease by 16% in the areas around the cull. You won’t find an independent scientist who will tell you that it made a meaningful contribution to controlling the disease.”

In fact, data from the trial showed that in some infected areas there was an increase in TB in cattle after the cull.

Animal rights groups also have concerns over the way the current trial culls are being managed.

In the past badgers have been trapped, caged and shot but in the new trial they are either being shot by marksmen as they run free or trapped. There have been allegations that some animals are being maimed and left to die a slow death.

The KBPG says that the cull is also sending out the wrong message to people who enjoy hunting wildlife.

“Not only is the cull unscientific but one of the net effects seems to be that people think it’s open season on badgers,” said Rachael. “Our fear is that it will mean people believe it’s okay to go around shooting and injuring them, whereas, in fact, badgers are protected by law.”

The KBPG, founded 20 years ago, has 50 members who patrol and monitor areas where badgers are known to live.

“Unfortunately, there are those who disturb them and dig them out of their setts,” added Rachael.

Most anti-cull protestors say there is strong evidence that the movement of cattle is the biggest factor in the spread of TB and point to the fact that there was a rapid increase in cases after the last major outbreak of foot and mouth disease when farms were being re-stocked with cattle. During the outbreak animals were either culled or confined.

They also claim that culling in one area simply leads to badgers moving away into other areas and culled regions soon become re-populated.

The trial cull will allow the shooting of up to 5,000 badgers in heavily affected areas. During the previous 10-year random trial when 11,000 badgers were shot, it was found that infection rates were – at their worst – around 16% but only 1.7% of the badgers were severely affected enough to be infectious.

This time around there will be no testing of culled badgers to see if they are carrying infection because the aim of the exercise is to find an effective way to kill the animals.

The recommendations of the 1997 – 2007 trial was that there should be greater cattle-based control measures, which is something that DEFRA has introduced.

But, as the protestors point out, such controls are only effective if properly policed.

“They are flouted all the time,” says Rachael. “The problem is in the way we farm and move cattle. The whole thing is politically motivated. Farmers are upset about TB and the Government needs to be seen to be doing something and is ignoring the science.”

Those backing the cull say that a two-pronged attack is needed to get rid of bovine TB in both wildlife and farm stock.

According to Rachael Gillbanks from the regional NFU, farmers are tackling the disease by testing animals and following transport restrictions.

She explained: “But we have seen similar issues in other parts of the world, such as New Zealand and Ireland, and nowhere in the world has managed to get on top of TB without tackling both cattle movement and the disease in wildlife, which is why the NFU is supporting the trial cull.”

The good news in Yorkshire is that our wildlife at the moment is deemed disease-free.

“Our farmers are doing whatever they can to maintain that,” added Rachael.

“There is a debate in the farming community about what they can do over and above what they are required to do to keep the area TB-free.”

But within the farming community there is still concern that TB is edging closer to Yorkshire. There is a feeling that if we don’t get on top of this disease we will have a problem up here,” said Rachael.

Veterinary surgeons around the country are divided over the ethics of a badger cull.

In some areas vets will be dealing with the consequences of bovine TB on a daily basis, while in Yorkshire there are only occasional, minor outbreaks. This may colour their view of the disease.

According to Mick Hancock, a large animal vet with Donaldson’s in Huddersfield, our badgers are safe – for the time being.

“Clinical cases of bovine TB are very rare in the West Yorkshire area,” he said. “We monitor all the time and very occasionally get a flare up due to a cow being brought in from another area, which is then controlled. It isn’t considered that there’s TB in the wildlife in this area.

“But that doesn’t mean to say that in the future we won’t get it.”

He feels that a vaccination programme for cattle would be the best solution, but that isn’t allowed under current EU law.

“Unfortunately, vaccinating the badgers, as they are doing in a trial in Wales, is expensive and difficult. It isn’t proven and is impractical,” he added.

Culling, while a solution taken in other countries with a bovine TB problem, is also unproven, he feels.

“We don’t have all the answers,” he said. “And it’s an emotive issue. The general public don’t want to see badgers being killed because at the moment there is no proof that it will do any good.”