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Cattle, buffalo and bison keepers must test their animals for bovine TB as part of a regime that reflects the regional risks of the disease.

You must complete the TB testing within the time frame given by the Animal and Plant Health Agency (APHA).

If you do not meet the deadlines, APHA will:

• apply movement restrictions to your animals
• notify the paying agencies

You may also get a:

• reduction of Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) scheme payments under cross compliance - overdue TB testing may be considered an intentional breach
• reduction of reactor compensation payments

APHA will take all the necessary steps to:

• facilitate the completion of the overdue testing
• recover reasonably incurred testing expenses

There are different surveillance TB testing intervals in England, Wales and Scotland.

Read the guidance to find the testing interval for your country or area. You can also check:

• the TB testing interval search tool
• Great Britain map of the TB testing intervals (PDF, 896 KB, 1 page)

England TB testing intervals

In England, the surveillance TB testing intervals are based on the regional level of disease risk.

The default TB testing intervals for herds are:

• 4 years in the low risk area (LRA)
• 6 or 12 months in the edge area
• 6 months in the high risk area (HRA)

Table 1: England TB testing intervals

For more information, see the:

• England TB testing intervals list (ODS, 234 KB) - by parish
• bovine TB surveillance testing in England

Changes to your individual herds surveillance testing intervals

If your herd is in a 6-monthly surveillance testing area, it may be eligible for annual testing. This rewards cattle keepers whose herds have a reduced risk of a TB breakdown.

You will need to meet at least one of the criteria:

• your herd has not had a TB breakdown for at least 6 years
• youre proactively trying to increase the resilience of your cattle to bovine TB by participating in a Cattle Health Certification Standards (CHECS) licensed bovine TB health scheme - CHECS TB entry level membership does not apply

In the LRA or annual testing parts of the edge area, you may need to follow a more intensive TB testing regime (radial testing). This is if your herd is within a 3 kilometre radius of a new lesion or culture positive TB breakdown herd.

In the LRA you may need to follow a more frequent testing regime by default for public health reasons. For example if you sell raw milk or have a city or open farm.

APHA will write to you if there are changes to your area or herd testing interval, explaining the reason for the change.

Pre-movement and post-movement testing

You must comply with statutory pre-movement testing requirements. This includes herds in the LRA that are tested more frequently than the default 4-yearly interval. For example herds on radial testing.

There are a limited number of exemptions to pre-movement testing.

You must arrange and pay for post-movement tests if you bring in cattle from other areas of England or from Wales and your herd is in the:

• LRA of England
• annual surveillance testing parts of the edge area of England

Read the guidance on pre-movement and post-movement testing and exemptions.

Wales TB testing intervals

In Wales, there is annual herd testing, regardless of the regional level of disease risk. The only exception are herds in the Intensive Action Area (IAA) which are tested every 6-months as part of the additional cattle controls in this area.

There is a regionalised approach to eradicating TB in Wales with low, intermediate and high TB areas. This allows:

• area specific control measures

• improved monitoring of changing disease patterns

• tracki

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