Report / Committee on Cattle Diseases.

  • Great Britain. Committee on Cattle Diseases.
Date:
1934
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Report / Committee on Cattle Diseases. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    84/166 (page 82)
    217. We consider that these three diseases fall into a different category from tuberculosis, inasmuch as they cause severe direct pecuniary loss to the farmer and are of less importance to the consuming public. The farmer does not feel the wastage in his herds from tuberculosis so acutely, though the disease is of great importance to public health. The technical assistance referred to already, together with the advice and guidance of the veterinary officers during their routine examinations of the herds should be sufficient to enable the farmer to eradicate these diseases. In the case of tuberculosis, however, he can never, in our opinion, successfully undertake eradication without assistance from the state. (e) Miscellaneous recommendations. (i) The relation of the research conducted by the Milk Marketing Boards to that conducted by government. 218. The establishment of the Milk Marketing Boards, with powers to expend money upon research into questions affecting the production of milk, raises an important question regarding the organisation of agricultural research in Great Britain, and as diseases of animals are among the most important subjects of investigation, we feel that this is a matter that may properly be raised in our report. We hold that it is of the first importance that the co-ordination of Government-assisted research on this subject, which is effected by the Agricultural Research Council, should in no way be weakened. We therefore recommend that the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries and the Department of Agriculture for Scotland should invite the attention of the Milk Marketing Boards to the fact that it is the policy of the Government that research should only be undertaken after consultation with, and with the concurrence of whichever is the appropriate council of the three research councils (the Advisory Council for Scientific and Industrial Research, the Medical Research Council and the Agricultural Research Council) now established under the Lord President of the Council; and should invite the Boards to adopt the principle that their funds should be expended on research in regard to dairying and animal diseases, only after consultation with the Agricultural Research Council and in a manner that will not conflict with the schemes of research already in progress. (ii) The standardisation of tuberculin. 219. Tuberculin for the testing of cattle is at present prepared by a number of different private firms. Many of these products are of a good quality; but in the absence of a standard of prescribed potency and purity it is only natural that some less satisfactory products are on the market, with the result that the efficacy of the tuberculin test is called in question. There is, however, the further important