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On November 4, the government of Denmark with the S label decided to mass slaughter all minks in the country, at least 14 million animals. This after the discovery that a mutated variant of the coronavirus has spread from mink to humans.
– We have a responsibility to our own population and with the confirmed mutation we have an even greater responsibility to the rest of the world, Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen explained at a press conference.
A few days later, the Berlingske newspaper revealed that the decision was contrary to Danish law and the government was forced to apologize. But by that time, several million minks had already been killed.
Mette Frederiksen and her The minority government has so far had broad support among the population for its handling of the corona pandemic. But the illegal instruction on the mass killing has sparked a political scandal, “minkgate,” as it has been popularly called, and is the biggest crisis for the Prime Minister since she took office after the 2019 parliamentary elections.
In recent weeks, it turned out, among other things, that the Minister of Food, Agriculture and Fisheries, Mogens Jensen, realized that the decision was illegal, but waited three days to inform the affected mink producers.
The Minister of Food, Agriculture and Fisheries has now been forced to resign at the same time as the Minister of Justice is criticized for ordering the National Police to help with the slaughter. Several bourgeois parties also question the responsibility of the Prime Minister and demand that the handling be investigated by a commission.
Parallel to political disputes cables of mink corpses swollen in huge pits are now being wired around the world; mink farmers crying as they see their life’s work destroyed; and farmers arriving with their tractors on the streets of Copenhagen in protest against the government’s handling of corona infection among Danish minks.
Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen, right, visited mink farmer Peter Hindbo on Thursday, at his now empty mink farm where all the minks have been killed.
Photo: Mads Nissen / AFP
On Thursday, images were also released of a Mette Frederiksen (S) crying in an empty mink barn in Jutland, when she visited an affected mink farmer who was about to hand over the business to her son, but was forced instead. to kill 25,000 minks.
– We have two generations of really good mink farmers, father and son, who in a very short time saw their life’s work crushed. It has been very emotional for them, and … it has also been for me, said the Prime Minister in a broken voice before the assembled press meeting.
Jutland is that area most affected by the decision to kill mink en masse. Here are the majority of the nearly 300 mink farms that have contracted corona infection among their flocks, and it was here that the most cases of the group 5 mutation were discovered among humans earlier this fall.
It was feared that the area would become “Wuhan of Denmark”. Tight restrictions were introduced in seven municipalities, including a ban on residents crossing municipal boundaries.
Now, the mutated variant of the coronavirus is in all likelihood extinct, according to the Danish Infection Control Agency, Statens Serum Institut. But that doesn’t help Danish mink farmers.
Despite all the travels, the Danish government has still managed to rally a political majority with the Enhedslisten, SF, De Radikale and Alternativet coalition parties to be able to kill every mink in the country.
This probably spells the end of the Danish mining industry. And it’s not a small thing. Denmark is the largest mink fur manufacturer in the world; Last year, the industry had a turnover of DKK 6.9 billion.
Read more: Minister: Not up to date with the ban on the mining industry
