Bovine tuberculosis control through mandatory testing and slaughter of reactors creates significant welfare costs. Understanding the welfare dimensions of TB control programmes enables more humane management.
The welfare dimensions of TB control are multifaceted. Individual reactor cattle face compulsory slaughter — a welfare outcome imposed by disease control necessity rather than animal welfare consideration. Whole herds under movement restrictions experience management disruption, altered social groups, and the cumulative stress of repeated testing. The broader wildlife welfare dimension involves badger culling programmes whose welfare costs — badgers experiencing prolonged death from non-fatal shooting, population disruption — are substantial and contentious. Vaccination approaches for both cattle and badgers offer a pathway to disease control with substantially lower welfare costs than current culling strategies. Welfare-aware TB control policy should prioritise vaccination development and deployment.