Thread: Decades of 1080….before and after

Originally Posted by Tahr

OSPRI are not far off (still a few years though) from having 'possum populations at the level where TB will not be able to be sustained in the remaining population. That will lead to NZ actually being TB free.

Also, objectively viewed, the net benefit from DOC 1080 use has been the saving of species. Imagine no 1080 and the total reliance on trapping. And/or bounties. Fairyland.

I'm a supporter of 1080, and hate it.

Hate seeing by-kill like Kea, but we need to look at the big picture and net benefits and not the one-off or infrequent negative events.

I have experience gained from working in Canada, a country declared TB free. I used to export CSL ( Australia ) Tuberculin to the USA for skin testing Elk and was involved when domestic Elk in Alberta imported from the US were found to have TB and the infected herds depopulated. From that experience I have a different perspective based on math. A clinical case TB possum will live two weeks, so it has two weeks to infect other possums or cattle. From this it is easy to calculate the probable infection rate factor for a given population density and this is what Ospri does. Unless possums are at a very high density it is obvious that TB cannot be maintained in possums, they die before they spread it. What is ignored is that Cattle are the natural host of Bovine TB and can carry a latent infection for ten years or more before they develop clinical disease and become infectious. During this 'latent carrier' period they do not react to a skin test. ( They do test positive to a BTB test ) A property with latent infections cannot be cleared using the skin test. Depopulation is the only way to clean up a persistently infected herd. Some herds have been 'I 10' status ( infected ten years ) despite annual air drops of 1080. TB is being 'Farmed' and jobs maintained with this slow control rather than elimination.