Dr. Damien Barrett:

No, the primary wildlife reservoir is badgers. There is evidence from Wicklow in particular, where there is full genome sequencing linking TB in cattle, deer and badgers in that area. We do not have that evidence in other parts of the country. We do not have enough samples to establish it. We are making the culture of plucks freely available to regional veterinary labs if people want to bring those in but we are not seeing the level of TB in deer that we saw in Wicklow. A lot of that has to do with the density of the deer population in County Wicklow. Populations are rising all over the country but the levels are particularly high in County Wicklow.