Bovine TB testing intervals
Guidance for cattle keepers on the bovine TB surveillance testing intervals for areas in England, Wales and Scotland.
Applies to England, Scotland and Wales
Cattle, buffalo and bison keepers must test their animals for bovine tuberculosis (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 in Scotland and Wales
You may also get:
- a reduction of reactor compensation payments
- in Scotland and Wales a reduction of Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) scheme payments under cross compliance - overdue TB testing may be considered an intentional breach
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:
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
| HRA: 6-monthly testing | Edge area: 6-monthly testing | Edge area: annual testing | LRA: 4-yearly testing |
|---|---|---|---|
| Avon | Berkshire (part) | Berkshire (part) | Bedfordshire |
| Cornwall | Cheshire | Buckinghamshire | Cambridgeshire |
| Devon | Derbyshire (part) | Derbyshire (part) | Cleveland |
| Dorset | Hampshire (part) | East Sussex | County Durham |
| Gloucestershire | Oxfordshire | Hampshire (part) | Cumbria |
| Hereford | Warwickshire | Leicestershire | Essex |
| Shropshire | Northamptonshire | Greater London | |
| Somerset | Nottinghamshire | Greater Manchester | |
| Staffordshire | Hertfordshire | ||
| West Midlands | Humberside | ||
| Wiltshire | Isle of Wight | ||
| Worcester | Isles of Scilly | ||
| Kent | |||
| Lancashire | |||
| Lincolnshire | |||
| Merseyside | |||
| Norfolk | |||
| Northumberland | |||
| North Yorkshire | |||
| South Yorkshire | |||
| Suffolk | |||
| Surrey | |||
| Tyne & Wear | |||
| West Sussex | |||
| West Yorkshire |
For more information, see the:
- - by parish
- bovine TB surveillance testing in England
Changes to your individual herd’s 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
- you’re 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
-
tracking progress against eradication targets
Counties in Wales are divided into smaller areas called spatial units. Each unit covers several complete parishes and has standardised herd numbers.
There are 59 spatial units in Wales. Each unit contains 225 herds on average.
Each unit has a name made up of the 2 first letters of the county name and a number. For example CL7 is spatial unit 7 in Clwyd.
Find the TB area and spatial unit for each parish using the:
- Wales TB regionalisation map on the Welsh Government website
The latest Wales TB eradication programme delivery plan was published on 28 March 2023.
Pre-movement and post-movement testing - Wales
You must comply with statutory pre-movement testing requirements unless exempt. From 1 February 2024 herds in the low TB area of Wales are no longer exempt from pre-movement testing requirements, other exemptions may still apply.
Cattle keepers in the low TB area of Wales must comply with post-movement testing requirements (unless exempt) when moving cattle in from herds:
- in the intermediate and high TB areas of Wales
- in the high risk or edge areas of England
- from Northern Ireland
From 1 February 2024, cattle keepers in the intermediate TB areas of Wales must also comply with post-movement testing requirements (unless exempt) when moving cattle in from herds:
- in the high TB areas of Wales
- in the high risk area of England
- from Northern Ireland
Scotland TB testing intervals
Scotland has been officially TB free (OTF) since September 2009. Since 2009, low risk herds are exempt from the default routine testing regime of 4 years that applies to all other non-exempt herds.
Your herd is considered low risk if you either:
- have fewer than 50 cattle (total stock on farm at 1 January in the year the herd is assessed) which have no more than one consignment of cattle moved on from high incidence TB areas (including Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland) in the past 4 years
- slaughter more than 25% of your stock annually in each of the past 4 years and have had no more than one consignment of cattle moved on from high incidence TB areas (including Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland) in the past 4 years
- slaughter more than 40% of your stock annually in each of the past 4 years
Slaughtered animals are animals that have been on the holding for at least 60 days and move from the farm either:
- direct to a slaughterhouse
- direct to market and then to the slaughterhouse
It does not include animals moved on to another holding temporarily between market and slaughterhouse.
The annual slaughter rate is total number of cattle slaughtered in a slaughterhouse in the past calendar year divided by the herd size (total stock on farm on 1 January).
APHA annually assesses each individual herd’s eligibility for exemption from TB testing. They will write to you to confirm your herd’s exemption status.
On 18 May 2023, legislation changed to include:
- stricter pre-movement testing requirements for cattle
- a new definition for ‘isolation’ of reactors, inconclusive reactors (IRs) and direct contacts (DCs)
- new compensation reductions for unclean cattle slaughtered for TB control purposes and reactors, IRs and DCs not properly isolated on farm
For more information, see the:
- guidance on pre-movement and post-movement testing
- Scottish government website for bovine TB control and surveillance in Scotland
Updates to this page
Last updated 1 February 2024 + show all updates
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Guidance updated with the extension of post-movement testing requirements to the intermediate TB areas of Wales and the re-instatement of pre-movement testing requirements for cattle moving from herds in the low TB area of Wales. Diweddarwyd y canllawiau drwy ymestyn gofynion profion ar ôl symud i gynnwys yr ardaloedd tb canolradd yng Nghymru ac adfer gofynion profion cyn symud ar gyfer gwartheg sy’n symud o fuchesi i’r ardal tb isel yng Nghymru.
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Removed cross compliance requirements for England. Cross compliance no longer applies in England from 1 January 2024.
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Added Welsh language translation.
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Guidance has been rewritten and updated throughout to reflect the latest situation and policy changes.
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The bovine TB surveillance testing in England policy has been updated.
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Updated Wales TB testing intervals section: 3 spatial units (GW1, CL1, CL2) have moved from the low TB area into the intermediate TB area North temporarily. For cattle keepers in these spatial units, post-movement testing requirements will no longer apply.
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Updated the England TB testing intervals.
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First published.