Coronavirus rips through Dutch mink farms, triggering culls

Public concerns rise as two workers catch the disease. In a sad sideshow to the COVID-19 pandemic, authorities in the Netherlands began to gas tens of thousands of mink on 6 June, most of them pups born only weeks ago. SARS-CoV-2 has attacked farms that raise the animals for fur, and the Dutch gover...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Science (American Association for the Advancement of Science) 2020-06, Vol.368 (6496), p.1169-1169
Main Author: Enserink, Martin
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Animal Husbandry
Animals
Betacoronavirus
Coronavirus Infections - epidemiology
Coronavirus Infections - transmission
COVID-19
Disease Reservoirs - virology
Farmers
Farms
Mink - virology
Netherlands - epidemiology
Pandemics
Pneumonia, Viral - epidemiology
Pneumonia, Viral - transmission
SARS-CoV-2
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Summary:Public concerns rise as two workers catch the disease. In a sad sideshow to the COVID-19 pandemic, authorities in the Netherlands began to gas tens of thousands of mink on 6 June, most of them pups born only weeks ago. SARS-CoV-2 has attacked farms that raise the animals for fur, and the Dutch government worries infected mink could become a viral reservoir that could cause new outbreaks in humans. The mink outbreaks are "spillover" from the human pandemic—a zoonosis in reverse that has offered scientists in the Netherlands a unique chance to study how the virus jumps between species and burns through large animal populations. But they're also a public health problem. Genetic and epidemiological sleuthing has shown that at least two farm workers have caught the virus from mink.
ISSN:0036-8075
1095-9203
DOI:10.1126/science.368.6496.1169