Animal Diseases
Dail Éireann — 2026-05-14
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Martin Heydon (FG), Kildare South

The helpline is up and running and has been since the middle of April. Communication has been a key part of everything I have done here. I will counter somewhat the Deputy's point that the message is not getting through. I refer to the encouraging progress of recent months in reducing bovine TB levels. Over the 12 months to 3 May, the herd incidence was 5.42%, down from 6.29%, the number of herds restricted was down by just over 5,400, or 14.8%, and the number of reactors was over 35,400, down 15.71%. We have seen significant reductions in herd incidence and reactor numbers in the past year. I believe that this reduction nationally is due to the combined efforts of all stakeholders in supporting farmers in reducing risk of bovine TB in their herds.
I am confident that the changes I have introduced will help drive the disease down further but I have no doubt that the discussions we had last summer, notwithstanding all of the reaction I got to them, made farmers in low-risk areas ask questions about what the risk category of the animal they were buying was. That is a conversation that needed to happen and it has definitely fed into these numbers.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-05-14/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:56+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-05-14