The Bovine Scourge: Meat, Tuberculosis and Public Health, 1850-1914

Investigation of the complex issues surrounding the links between bovine tuberculosis and infected meat - with a contemporary resonance in the BSE scare.

By the late 1890s, the question of bovine tuberculosis (TB) and infected meat had become one of national importance, reflecting a national sense of fear. Although the extent of the threat to health proved uncertain, bovine TB hadcome to stand at the centre of debates about diseased meat and public health. The anxiety it caused was part of a longer story, linked to concern over food safety, changes in how tuberculosis was understood, and to worries over diseased meat and the 'evils' of the urban meat trade. The Bovine Scourge explores the debates and fears that came to surround bovine TB, meat and public health between the 1860s and 1914. It traces how diseased meat and bovine TB emerged as a public health issue, examines the measures adopted to protect the public, and addresses how by the Edwardian era milk had become the major source of concern in discussion of bovine TB. It also raises important questions about the history of food safety, the concerns generated by diseased meat, and the role of the public health and veterinary profession in preventing the sale of contaminated food.
KEIR WADDINGTON is a senior lecturerin the School of History and Archaeology at Cardiff University.