Just like humans, cows can get tuberculosis, and this is a major problem for farmers who can lose all their herd and therefore a lot of money if their animals get infected. Humans can also catch TB from infected cows by drinking their milk as the bacteria can linger in cow glands and end up in their udders. It is widely believed that badgers are responsible for the spread of TB between cows but how exactly the little horrors manage this is up for debate. At a TB conference we posed this question to a well know scientist who rather than laughing at our weirdness, attempted to answer it. His theories included something to do with regurgitation of grass by cows allowing bacteria deposited in the pastures by Mr Badger to get into the cow lungs. My favorite was the snuffling theory in which bacteria on the grass is disturbed by the cow nosing the grass as it greedily devours its lunch producing aerosols that the cow inhales.
Another scientist later told us that badgers get TB so badly that the infection ends up in their entire body, not just their lungs, and is passed out of the body in the urine. For some reason cows really like to sniff badger urine and they end up with TB. Bizarre.
