Minks in Denmark: what is known so far about the coronavirus mutation in these animals

It is called Cluster 5 and due to its proliferation, it forced the Danish government to sacrifice 15 million of these animals. Here the details.

The Mutation of the coronavirus in mink in Denmark that was reported by six countries to the World Health Organization (WHO) “is a concern” for all of Europe.

In recent days, the Danish Prime Minister, Mette Frederiksen, announced the slaughter of the more than 15 million minks in that country, due to a COVID-19 mutation transmitted by these animals to 12 people in September, which could threaten the efficacy of a vaccine treatment.

“The mutation of coronavirus in mink is a concern that is beginning, which is being investigated by international organizations, but it is still too early to draw any conclusions about its dangerousness,” Roberto Debbag, vice president of the Society, told the Télam agency Latinoamericana de Infectología Pediátrica and director of the World Society of Pediatric Infectology.

“The WHO considers that it is still too early to be able to draw a conclusion if these coronaviruses found in mink have any characteristics that would increase the transmissibility or contagion or the severity in the pandemic that we are experiencing with COVID-19,” added Debbag.

Which countries have coronavirus with minks

The six countries that reported cases, according to the WHO today, are Denmark, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, Italy and the United States.

“It seems to the WHO that it is premature, however, Denmark decided to euthanize millions of these animals,” said Eduardo López, head of the Department of Medicine at the Ricardo Gutiérrez Children’s Hospital.

The infectologist explained that according to the international organization “this variant, called ‘Cluster 5’, presents a combination of mutations or changes that had not been previously observed “ and stressed that these modifications “were not yet well understood.”

How the Cluster 5 strain of COVID-19 works

Preliminary results indicated that it has a “moderately reduced sensitivity to neutralizing antibodies.”

“What we do not know is whether this has a very specific phylogenetic relationship, at least it has not been published, with respect to the Covid-19 virus that is circulating or is it a classic animal coronavirus,” López clarified to Télam, and He stressed that they are working “to avoid some risk.”

“We must be vigilant, but today it still does not have a high degree of concern, we must continue working to control this pandemic that is affecting us all,” Lopez concluded.

How is the coronavirus mutation

According to the scientific community, the mutation of a virus is something banal and often without consequences, but in the case of the Cluster 5 strain it implies, according to the first studies, a lower efficacy of human antibodies, which threatens the efficiency of a vaccine against Covid-19.

Before Denmark, the Spanish region of Aragon had ordered the slaughter of some 100,000 minks from a farm in July, where almost 90% of the animals had tested positive for the new coronavirus.

The Netherlands, long one of the world’s leading mink producers, took similar action last summer, ordering the definitive closure of all mink farms starting in 2021 to prevent the sector from becoming a nest of infections, which precipitated the end of that industry initially planned for 2024, according to the AFP agency.

How is the mink market

According to Humane Society International, about 60.5 million minks are raised worldwide, with the main fur producers being China, Denmark, Finland and Poland.

The largest number of mink farms is in Denmark (17.6 million), followed by Poland (5 million), the Netherlands (4.5 million), Finland (1.85 million), Lithuania and Greece (1.2 million ), according to that association.

Meanwhile, each year around 100 million animals are killed for their fur in the world, 37 million of them in the European Union, although the growing importance of the animal cause in the last two decades has been affecting the development of the animal industry. skins all over the world.

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