Denmark will cull all its mink – as many as 17 million. After a mutated form of coronavirus that can spread to humans was found on mink farms.
Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said the mutated virus posed a “risk to the effectiveness” of a future Covid-19 vaccine.
Denmark is the world’s biggest producer of mink fur and its main export markets are China and Hong Kong.
Warning: you may find a picture of dead mink lower down disturbing
Denmark plans to cull up to 17 million mink, the country’s entire population, after reports that the animals could pass a coronavirus mutation to humans. The announcement came from Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen at a press conference. And there are currently no published scientific reports on the mutation or its effects.
The virus has been found at over 200 mink farms in Denmark, which produces most of the world’s mink fur. Over a million animals were already culled on Danish farms in October. This summer, about 100,000 mink were culled in Spain after similar outbreaks. Outbreaks on mink farms in Utah killed thousands of animals.
Denmark’s announcement comes after 12 people in the country were found to be infected with a type of the novel coronavirus that had also been found on mink farms. The goal of today’s order is to keep this particular mutation from spreading. “Continued mink breeding will entail significant risk to public health. Both nationally and internationally,” Kare Molbak, executive vice president of Denmark’s infectious disease authority, said at the press conference.
Right now, there is no scientific data publicly available on this mutation or its behavior. Though Frederiksen claimed today that the variant is less sensitive to antibodies against the virus. It will take more context to understand the mutation and the impact it might have on the trajectory of the pandemic and the development of both treatments and vaccines. “Scientists will update when we have more info,” tweeted virologist Emma Holcroft, a post-doctoral researcher at the University of Basel in Switzerland.
