How badger culling became polarised

WITH Defra due to be updating its bovine TB (bTB) strategy soon,1 it is worth considering how polarised views emphasised by the Godfray panel2 might best be resolved. One of the main controversies of recent years has been the usefulness of the badger cull. Division has run far deeper than any tired wildlife versus farming narrative, or unsubstantiated perspective on bias. Scientific issues have had the most polarising influence. The Randomised Badger Culling Trial (RBCT) in 2007 claimed that badger culling could play ‘no meaningful role’ in bTB control.3 As badger culling preparations began in 2011, this view was maintained publicly, by both those who designed and ran the RBCT and Robert May, a previous government chief scientific adviser. An alternative view by the next government chief scientific advisor, David King,4 led to plans for badger culling. More recently, polarisation has established due to some scientists publicly questioning the RBCT statistical analyses,6 claiming newly discovered flaws do not support the conclusions, while others have restated, amplified or sought to defend the original analyses.7 This includes Defra agencies, which still rely upon many estimations parametrised by RBCT calculations that have been called into question.8 In 2025, Mark Brewer's call for a ‘proper investigation be conducted to establish an agreed position involving all parties’9 and collective dialogue is welcome. Further, a better understanding of the sensitivity and specificity of the single intradermal comparative cervical tuberculin (SICCT) test in 201810 has sadly still not removed the unhelpful ‘inconclusive reactor’ label in England, which wrongly, in my view, attributed a ‘hidden reservoir’ to badgers, in line with stale RBCT thinking. Importantly, polarisation continues to hamper the development of a coherent evidence base for an effective bTB control policy. It stems from a misplaced reluctance to openly address the sequence of poor historic advice going back 30 years and the uncertainty as to whether badger culling experimental outcomes are sound, as if it simply does not matter.2 “Polarisation continues to hamper the development of a coherent evidence base for an effective bTB control policy