Progress for Animals: Vaccinations to Replace Cruel Badger Cull
After years of campaigning and action by animal protection groups including PETA, the government has finally announced that the cruel badger cull will be phased out.
The intensive culling – that is, killing – of these sensitive animals is to be replaced by a vaccination programme for cows on dairy farms to stop the spread of bovine tuberculosis (TB).
This is great news because the practice of gunning down much-loved, intelligent, and curious badgers not only is inhumane but also has proved ineffective in tackling TB, as has been made clear repeatedly by leading scientific experts.
Vaccination is a humane option – but because bovine TB outbreaks are predominantly caused by the intensive rearing and movement of cattle, ditching dairy and cows’ flesh and eating plants instead is the only truly sustainable way to stop the disease from spreading – and doing so would also spare millions of cows a fate worse than death.
What You Can Do
Milk production is cruel. On dairy farms, cows are forcibly impregnated via artificial insemination, only for their beloved calves to be torn away from them so the milk that nature intended for their babies can instead be consumed by humans. Both mother cows and their calves are traumatised when separated from each other. For days afterwards, the mothers bellow in desperation and the calves bawl in distress – all in vain.
Male calves – who are viewed by farmers as “by-products” – are either shot at birth or destined to be raised for veal. Females, like their mothers, face a lifetime of repeated forcible impregnation and anguish over their lost babies. Their bodies are pushed to the limit in order to squeeze out every last drop of milk.
If it weren’t for humans’ obsession with cows’ mammary gland secretions, badgers would never have had to endure barbaric culling. And cows wouldn’t have to go through hell every day on dairy farms. The best thing you can do to protect badgers and cows is to go vegan:
