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SUMMARY:Persistence and control of bTB in Great Britain - Andrew Conlan (V
 et School)
DTSTART:20110309T140000Z
DTEND:20110309T150000Z
UID:TALK30187@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:Danielle Stretch
DESCRIPTION:Bovine tuberculosis is a notifiable infectious disease of catt
 le caused by Mycobacterium bovis.  Although the potential for zoonotic tra
 nsmission exists\, pasteurization of milk has effectively eliminated this 
 risk within Great Britain.  The impetus for control is therefore largely e
 conomic. The current test-and-slaughter policy cost £108 million in 2008-
 2009.  Recent research on bTB has focused on understanding the relative ro
 les played by cattle-movements and the wildlife reservoir of infection in 
 badgers.  Despite intensive research\, the role of badgers in the natural 
 history of infection of cattle herds is still poorly characterised.  Howev
 er\, the control of bTB is based on a diagnostic test that has both poor s
 ensitivity and specificity leading to the possibly that recurrence of bTB 
 on individual farms may be a function simply of leaving hidden infection o
 n a premise when it is declared "bTB free". We set out to develop within-h
 erd transmission models of bTB\, parameterised from measures of the within
 -herd persistence of bTB. We use these empirical targets in an Approximate
  Bayesian Computation (ABC) framework to obtain parameter estimates for ou
 r model which are consistent with the natural history of transmission of b
 TB in Great Britain.  From our parameterised model we hope to explore how 
 the efficiency of the current testing regime can be improved to reduce the
  burden of bTB testing in GB.
LOCATION:MR4\, Centre for Mathematical Sciences\, Wilberforce Road\, Cambr
 idge
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