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British Badgers Granted Stay of Execution

Scientific American - Posted: October 23rd, 2012, 12:16pm EDT

pLONDON (Reuters) - Britain has delayed a plan to shoot thousands of badgers to stop the spread of tuberculosis in cattle in the face of overwhelming public opposition to the cull./ppCritics of the cull, which was supported by farmers, said it would be ineffective, not least because fleeing badgers would simply spread the disease beyond the pilot areas in southwest England where it had been due to begin shortly./ppThe debate is a sensitive one in Britain, where the mass slaughter of cattle to control disease in livestock has left deep scars in farming communities following outbreaks of other diseases over the past two decades./ppLast year, 26,000 affected cattle were slaughtered and the disease cost taxpayers 90 million pounds ($145 million), including compensation to farmers./ppEnvironment Secretary Owen Paterson said on Tuesday the delay had been due to surveys showing a higher number of badgers than thought in the afflicted areas. a href=http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=british-badgers-granted-stay[More]/a

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