Brian May: ‘Badgers are irrelevant in spread of cattle TB’
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 7 ก.พ. 2025
- Queen guitarist and animal rights campaigner Sir Brian May has staked his life on badgers playing no role in the transmission of bovine TB.
He believes badgers do not play a part in transmitting TB to cattle, and attributes disease spread primarily to flaws in cattle testing and poor farm biosecurity.
He spoke to Farmers Weekly in an exclusive interview ahead of the screening of his new BBC documentary on Friday, 23 August, covering everything from his views on peer-reviewed science related to bovine TB transmission, the role of cattle vaccination to his response to Clarkson's comments about his views on the issue.
#badgers #badgercull #clarkson #tbfree #bovinetb #farmers #farminguk #policy #brianmay
I recall going to a lecture ref Defra research some years ago and it was clear that cattle to cattle transfer was most likely cause of TB being spread to herds and wildlife. Political reluctance to tackle this means farmers continue to face heartache and stress. It could have been so different.
@@PaulAnn-y2b Not what was said, transfer of TB once infected was by cattle to cattle, initial infection was from badger to cattle.
I am thoroughly disgusted with all these negative comments about Brian. Why do you think he was knighted? If it wasn't for dear Sir Brian the general public wouldn't even be aware of this problem. He said at the end of the excellant documentary, he will see this through to the end as he's so passionate about all this relating to our wonderful wildlife. As through (usual stupid humans) we are rapidly finding certain species disappearing in our countryside, we need a solid upright prominate figure like Brian to speak out and address this terrible situation. What harm have the badgers & hedgehogs done to us. You only have to look at the poor farmer who had to loose a precious animal on the film. I salute Brian, admire him for all he tries to do and employ people to check out the Save Me Trust. We have yet to see a response from this new government on the documentary. I have a 6 year old grandson, who loves seeing all things out in the wild. What will there be for him to see in years to come?
The mafia (firm) is a gangsta family of freemasonry. Knighted just means you did your bit to entrain the masses promoting sodomy and satanism. Agenda 21 involves depopulation of living food stock and manufactured shortages of grain, wheat etal to accomplich carbon net zero. Mr May is 🙌⚠️
Yaaaaaaaaaaaay!
Way to go, Brian!
Very good!
That's the spirit!
Give the badgers a break, time for a different strategy
The basic problem here is humans. We like a countryside which is completely devoid of top predators, since obviously we don't like looking out for bears, wolves, lions and the like. So, we exterminated the lot of 'em and started doing so in the early Neolithic, such was our dislike for them.
No top predators means nothing keeping the numbers of mesopredators like foxes and badgers down, unless the biggest, nastiest top predator of the lot steps in and does the job instead. That is how things used to be; humans used to keep badger numbers down and indeed badger hams were a country delicacy. There was even a bit of Irish marketing of badger meat going on in days of yore; the Irish claimed that there were two species of badger in their country. The Pig-badger was a gentle beast, wholly vegetarian and lovely to eat whereas the dog-badger was a vile scavenger, verminous of habit and dire of taste.
If you let the badger population hit the ground's carrying capacity for badgers, you wave farewell to ground-nesting bumblebees. No bumblebees and all plants that rely on them for pollination (honeybees are not an adequate substitute) start to get very rare. Badgers in this state are also ideally placed to carry any disease that gets into the area, and to act as reservoir hosts for it. They also drive the population of hedgehogs to zero, which also impacts the ecosystem.
Dr May is a musician and astrophysicist. He is not a biologist or epidemiologist and oh boy it shows. It really shows.
Several large-scale field trials have been conducted, most notably at Thornbury where badgers were experimentally eliminated from an isolated area of ground. Three months in and the bTB levels in cattle plummeted from endemic to zero and stayed there for a very long time. That there is the classic field trial: alter one factor and watch the results: case closed. Badgers are the problem.
You didn't watch the doc did you. The science shows that badgers aren't the problem. Experiment has also concluded a solution.
If the test is not effective and contaminated cows are circulating in the herd anyway doesnt this render irrelevant killing the ones that are detected? One thing is sure, this shows that being able to follow a plant base diet is a major blessing, it leaves one out of all these moral dilemas and uncertainties.
@@Nada-adaN LOL LOL LOL.
Brian..I wish you Health...we need you Amazing Musician... ❤
Is there no hope for vaccinating badgers? Western Europe pushed back rabies with vaccinated bait. Is there something about TB in badgers that isn’t compatible? Very interesting interview, thanks. Best wishes from the French alps, Colin.
Vaccinate the cows!
Yes, there is. Badgers and all mustelids lack a certain amount of immune system genetics, which handicaps their immune response to bTB and means that however much BCG vaccine you inject into them over however many weeks, you do not ever get complete immunity.
You also don't get much better immunity in humans and cows, which do have fully working immune systems; you certainly don't get enough to wipe the disease out.
I was discussing this with this bloke the other day and he said he hated badgers, 'stripey bastards' he called them. I said that's a hate crime, or something anyway. He just laughed. Sign of rhe times I suppose.
Suddenly he doesnt care about peer reviewed studies 😂
Hmm I'm strangely drawn to a year around the mid eighties.
Nonsense is the word that springs to mind.
Who owns fw.
What are their goals.
I'd rather two separate interviews with scientists, one of them being a cancelled scientist.
This fella has PhD in astro something or other.
Anyone can soon catch up if they read.
@@roberthiggins6401ask the guitar player
This documentary has taken 14 years to complete. Hes right on the defra test. Its antiquated
I'm afraid Brian is very misleading in his assumptions.
Yep. Peer reviewed is not legitimate according to this guy whereas a musician with no scientific knowledge in this field should be beleive.
Totally inverted nonsense. And fw seems to have an agenda.
@roberthiggins6401 but the musician didn't carry out the scientific tests. He got people qualified in the field to do that.
And as TB is still a huge problem in English and Welsh herds......slaughtering badgers clearly isn't working.
@paulandhisguitars
It won't work because it's probably spread by cattle themselves so even if they wipe out all the badgers It will still be around
@kingfisher3011 Did you mean to send that to me?
@paulandhisguitars
I agree Paul but they're using him because of his large following.
If they use their scientists, they're all being paid and have to toe the line.
The fairest way is to have scientists from both sides. Anyone that speaks out is cancelled.
Get The light mag, paper
He's a guitarist in a successful band FFS, his money and fame give him a voice which others do not have. Why not start asking footballers to sort out the financial mess we are in or ask boxers to represent us in world politics
He's a highly intelligent man with a very scientific brain that was intelligent enough to surround himself with scientific brains who specialise in the subject discussed to find the actual cause of the spread of bovine TB. And it looks like his team have found the cause and answer.
He also happens to play guitar in an exceptionally successful band.
Absolutely, he has a level of intelligence to sort out any problem in a scientific manner. He is an absolute gentleman, wanting the best for the farmers and the badger alike. He is a keen gardener with an interest in rhododendrons.
Do farmers have an opinion on how guitars should be made? May should repair the damage done in Brazil to the ancient trees lost.
Lo hizo publicamente en 1995
Already did years ago.
@@p.s.2008 that's a very defensive stance. Don't get offended by facts just because they're dished out by a guitarist. Or maybe you just like killing badgers for no good reason?
He made his guitar out of recycled items. Not sure what your point is.
What a shit show, terrible for farmers, terrible for the badgers and the environment.
TB is not an infectious disease - real answer.
Estan todos quejándose porqué no habla de otra cosa,háganse famosos a nivel mundial y haganlo ustedes mismos
Hedgehogs are predated by badgers. This has been shown on film and video this is proof positive.
How is that relevant to TB?
Badgers urinate constantly, which is seen in numerous videos and CCTV footage .
@@skepticalbadgerIt isn’t. I assume it’s another excuse to kill badgers.🙄
Very obvious that by far and away the greatest damage to hedgehog population is, surprise surprise, the removal of hundreds of miles of, you guest it, hedges. That and being run over by cars. If that colossal self serving disingenuous twat Jeremy Clarkson hadn't fuelled the illogical as well as immoral hatred of badgers in his series I very much doubt people would be commenting on badgers as significant hedgehog predators at all. It's an utter disgrace that the Conservative government ignored the study showing culling had no significant impact on reducing bovine tb and pedalled the myth it did to farmers. Shame on them and respect to Brian Nay and his team. And as for the comment on would farmers advise on wooden guitars that destroy rainforests , I mean could you get any more inane?
@@guitartommo2794 Did you watch the interview pre the documentary ?
Rock on 🤘 well said sir Brian 👍🇬🇬
Is that sarcasm?
@@roberthiggins6401 not at all. But if the cows say here get TB and it’s spreads what would do it. no badgers here to give it to the pure bread guernsey cows 👍🇬🇬
@stuartdelamare4072
I've no idea where you are but if you've no badgers that's why you've no tb perhaps. That's my answer on what you've written to me.
I do wonder if tb is man made though? Is there a patent on it?
@@roberthiggins6401 more than likely there’s a patent on everything. bill the farmer gates owns most of them. but as far as I know our cows still get TB in the Channel Islands and there’s no badger’s no moles no squirrels no deer no foxes so we would be a perfect place for the experiment here in Guernsey 🤷🏻♂️👍🇬🇬
@@roberthiggins6401 I just asked someone and was told we last had TB occurrence in the bailiwick in 1937. soooo maybe not a great place to test Ay I do apologise 👍🇬🇬
I have video footage of badger and hedgehog feeding from the same food bowl
Which proves what exactly?
@@th7245 proves they don't always kill hedgehogs
@@kingfisher3011Well we know that, but they DO kill hedgehogs though.
Cars and chemicals have killed most the hedgehogs. Not badgers @@th7245
@@th7245so what? Badgers and hedgehogs have coexisted in the British Isles for hundreds of thousands of years. Let's not invent a problem that doesn't exist.
Keep to a guitar mayo
Cattle-cattle transmission does not explain the predominantly South-West (cold maritime climate) distribution in the British Isles.
Isn’t this just where there are more cattle?
Because there is no transmission of anything called TB.
Peer review, is science
What is enhance testing?
Enhanced testing is where they test for the presence of the bacteria in the dung and the saliva, and I think they also test for the presence of antibodies in the blood. It's much more accurate than the standard skin test. They proved that cattle testing negative with the skin test were actually TB positive and spreading the disease within the heard. Watch the documentary, it's an eye opener.
As well as skin testing, excrement testing, saliva testing and blood testing.
Ah yes, Doctor Brian May. I once listened to a very passionate May supporter telling us that as May was a "Doctor" he "knew all about badger science and stuff"
She was quite miffed to be reminded that his doctorate was for star gazing.
It's just as well that Brian has qualified experts in his team. Watch the doc.
@@koleberdinoch926 I prefer to listen to independent experts who are not in May's team.Just by being on his team they will be biased.
@@Simonsimon-fy3hq The independent experts akready said culling badgers was ineffective. Watch the documentary.
@@koleberdinoch926 Do you have a link to their report?
@@Simonsimon-fy3hq I don't have a link, it's on bbc iPlayer
This fella is just delusional, only wants to believe his theory. Anything contradicting what he believes is just “nonesense”
Badgers use their own latrines end of
Brian is very much in denial, which has mislead his judgement.
Brian is lying constantly, the decrease of cattle has been taken into account when assessing the decrease of BTB.
Another activist working for the nwo agenda. Such a shame as i loved most of their music.
Seems fw are onboard with the agenda.
Just because someone is famous doesn't mean they are speaking the truth, it just means they have a large following of often the unquestioning and take at face value.
NWO agenda? What on earth are you on about? The man just loves animals.
Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results is crazy.
I feel if all these people are against the badger cull if a farmers cattle get TB they will reimburse the farmer out of the own pockets then you would see a different side of the coin. Easy to say don't do this dont do that when its not costing you