TUBERCULOSIS IN CATTLE.

Taranaki Daily News, 11 September 1920, Page 8

TUBERCULOSIS IN CATTLE.

REMARKS OP DIRECTOR OF LIVE STOCK. In the course of his address at Bell Block on Monday evening, Mr. A. R. Voting, director of live stock' referred to tuberculosis remarking:— After 20 years of observation of the working of the Act dealing with tliie subject I am decidedly of opinion that the spirit of the Act could be better observed than is being done. The intention of allowing compensation for disease was clearly that of helping the farmer to stamp out disease where possible and also in the interest of the. public health. Let us take the disease tuberculosis in cattle. The first question is: "Can this disease in cattle be stamped out!" and the answer mußt be in the affirmative. That being so, we have to ask ourselves what has been done in this direction first by the department and then by the farmer. The department tests all new arrivals for tuberculosis; it pays compensation for condemned stock; it also provides free of charge, not only the testing material, but also the services of the veterinarian. And the farmer, what has he done except in isolated cases where herds are tested? What he does is this. He keeps a cow for several years, gets a few calves off he'r, sella, and. otherwise uses her products. Then when the animal shows marked signs of the disease he writes or wires the inspector to come quick. The inspector arrives and promptly condemns the animal and pays compensation, after the animal has in all probability done all the damage likely to be done in disseminating the disease, the farmer's only regret being that the compensation allowed appears inadequate—inadequate for what —replacement. This was never intended by the Act, which intended any monetary consideration to be in the interest of the public health and for the suppression of the disease, and it should be clearly understood by farmers that the market value is not what the animal could have brought in the sale yard if it had been healthy, but the price the farmer could have secured for the animal in the state it was in just before examination by the inspector.

The value of this test for the purposes of diagnosing tuberculosis has been proved beyond all doubt and should, undoubtedly, be taken greater advantage of as a means of eradicating tuberculosis. What has already been done hardly counts in this direction, because no systematic effort has ever been made in New Zealand to take advantage of its practical use. The mere fact that a few farmers already test their herds could not be looked upon as any satisfactory progress towards the eradication of this disease. If a body of farmers in any one locality were to agree amongst themselves to have all their cows tested with the tuberculin test I have 110 doubt the Government would give them somfe assistance by way of additional compensation upon the distinct understanding that they would not introduce any other cow into their herds without the animal first having passed the tuberculin test. .As an example of how this could be accomplished, take tile districts of Nelson and Marlborough. ,• A few thousand pounds would,'' iii my opinion, stamp the disease entirely out of these localities and what a grand thing it would be for the breeders to be able to say that their stock was free from the disease. Not only that, but by including a wider area into the scheme it allows of a better interchange of animals than would be the case on a smaller scale. AH efforts to stamp out tuberculosis | upon a small scale lias been so surrounded with the difficulties as to render any 'chance of success very small, but'taking a whole county, I have no hesitation in saying that it could be done, and once proved in any country it would, I have no doubt, be quickly adopted by others, and I am of opinion that with a vigorous campaign in the stamping out of l tuberculosis by the use of the tuberculin test, in conjunction with the pay'ing of compensation as at present, we would be in a very few years considerably reduce, if not in many parts totally eliminate tuberculosis from herds. Not only so, but if tuberculosis is s once eradicated from milking animals it will very soon make itself less evident in the pig industry, and although at first it might be an additional expense, yet the result in a few years would compensate the country both from a health and a financial point of view. It is extremely distressing to be under the impression that children especially are drinking milk from tuberculosis animals and from a financial point of view it is regrettable that so many fine carcases have to lie sent to the boiling-down pot after considerable expense has been incurred in the rearing of them to the atage of slaughter.