[ad_1]
In Denmark, authorities are now trying to stop a major outbreak of the coronavirus in mink.
– A total of 80 mink farmers have been affected and we estimate that more than one million minks have been infected by the coronavirus in total, says emergency manager Nikolas Kühn Hove of the Danish Food Safety Authority in Dagbladet.
The Danish Food and Veterinary Administration corresponds to the Norwegian Food Safety Authority.
– It is very, very, very serious, continues the emergency manager, who says that infected minks constitute about 8 percent of all minks found in Denmark.
Infects humans
According to Hove, work is now underway to map transmission routes.
– We know that the main infection comes from humans, but there is also another route of infection, which is unknown. We can’t explain that all infection in mink farms comes from humans, so there must be another route of infection as well, he says.
Therefore, mink can be infected with the coronavirus by humans. But the infection can also go the other way, says Hove.
see more
– At least twice, people have been infected by minks on farms. We can also say with certainty that 150 people who work on these farms have contracted the virus, but we can only say that two have been directly infected by mink, he says.
– We do not know how the others have been infected, adds the emergency manager.
Excess mortality
According to the Norwegian Food Safety Authority, it has also been established that mink in Spain and the Netherlands have been infected with SARS-CoV-2 by people with covid-19.
Symptoms of covid-19 in mink are diarrhea, vomiting, or respiratory symptoms or increased temperature that cannot be attributed to any other cause.
Hove of the Danish Food and Veterinary Administration says excess mortality is very low in Denmark.
– We see a very small excess mortality. The symptoms are the same in mink as in humans, but not as severe, he says.
– Virusfabrikker
Still, he’s very worried.
– When the virus is in a herd of 10,000 minks, there is a risk that the virus will mutate. It is very serious, says the emergency manager.
– Our biologists, who study the virus, have already found some mutations in the protein found on the surface of the virus, he adds.
Mink farms can become factories for pure viruses, and this in turn can affect the effect of a vaccine, chief physician Anders Fomsgaard, head of virus research and development at the Statens Serum Institut, tells Danmarks Radio.
Fear of the massacre by the vaccine
– Mutates only in mink
– We have seen that some mutations of the virus occur in mink, which only occur in mink and not in humans. There are more and more of these mutations, in tune with more farms becoming infected, Fomsgaard says.
According to the superior, the minks of North Jutland are infected with a special variant of the coronavirus.
– The concern is that the viruses that have mutated in the mink will go out into society and infect people with a strain of virus that is insensitive to the vaccines they are now working to develop.
– It is the vaccines that will save us and ensure collective immunity, so that we can return to normality, he continues.
In an attempt to stop the infection, it was decided that all minks within a 7.8 kilometer radius of an infected mink farm will be killed.
WHO: – The vaccine will not be the end
Mass monitoring
Emergency manager Hove tells Dagbladet that very strict infection control rules have also been introduced for everyone who works on mink farms in Denmark.
– Now we have massive monitoring of mink farms, and all farms must send virus samples continuously, he says.
