Geronimo the alpaca on death row, but protesters ready to defend him

LONDON• An army of Brits and a determined owner are planning to form a “human shield” to save Geronimo the alpaca after government officials ordered he must be killed because he poses a health risk.

The pro-alpaca faction has drawn allies as prominent as Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s father, as protesters — and alpacas — are also set to march outside Number 10 Downing Street on Monday afternoon local time in an effort to get officials to reconsider the decision.

A warrant was signed for Geronimo’s destruction after he tested positive for bovine tuberculosis, an infectious respiratory disease among cattle which can be passed to humans through nasal contact and also through other bodily fluids such as saliva and urine.

Almost 100,000 people have signed a petition calling on the British government to reverse a legal ruling that the six-year-old animal be put down as soon as Monday. Those fighting for Geronimo say he should be retested using the latest equipment, which they claim could prove he isn’t infected.

Veterinary nurse Helen Macdonald, who owns the woolly creature and an alpaca farm in Gloucestershire, England, says she is skeptical of the tests conducted after Geronimo arrived on British soil from New Zealand, but her legal appeal of the ruling was denied.

Macdonald believes the tests results returned a false positive because Geronimo had been given the tuberculin vaccine before testing with led to antibodies in his system. Before Geronimo was imported to England from New Zealand in 2017, he underwent four skin tests which all came back negative. The other alpacas who travelled with Geronimo from New Zealand all returned negative results, according to media reports. According to Macdonald, the alpaca is healthy and does not pose a threat.

Pressure is mounting on the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs to retest the animal, who has a fleecy black coat and small tufts of curly hair on his head.

Speaking to PA news agency last week, Macdonald launched a blistering attack on officials, urging them to review the kill warrant.

“It’s a total load of lies, the testing has never been validated,” she said as Downing Street confirmed that there were “no plans for any further tests.”

British media reported that Macdonald was determined to protect the animal from being killed — alongside a group of volunteers who have promised to guard Geronimo’s enclosure from police by creating a “human shield.”

Defending the government’s decision to destroy Geronimo, Environment Secretary George Eustice said that the ruling was “arduous but necessary” and that the test used has an accuracy rate of over 99 per cent. He said that only 0.34 per cent of cases see a “false positive.”

“Geronimo tested positive twice using a test called the Enferplex test. It is the test that was requested by the British Alpaca Society at the time,” he said, adding that he had reviewed the animals cases many times.