{"id":18298,"date":"2024-12-13T09:03:07","date_gmt":"2024-12-13T10:03:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/?p=18298"},"modified":"2024-12-13T10:29:16","modified_gmt":"2024-12-13T10:29:16","slug":"for-wild-animals-the-bird-flu-disaster-is-already-here","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/?p=18298","title":{"rendered":"For Wild Animals, the Bird Flu Disaster Is Already Here"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Scientists are concerned that the H5N1 virus could set off another human pandemic. But it is already putting species under pressure in the wild.<\/p>\n

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Every spring, more than 200,000 northern gannets \u2014 stocky seabirds with dazzling white feathers \u2014 journey to the coast of eastern Canada. There, they blanket oceanside cliffs and rocky outcroppings, breeding in enormous colonies before flying back south for the winter.<\/p>\n

But in May 2022, as many females were getting ready to lay their eggs, the birds began dying in droves. \u201cThousands of northern gannets started to wash up on our shores,\u201d said Stephanie Avery-Gomm, a seabird biologist and research scientist at Environment and Climate Change Canada.<\/p>\n

The culprit: a bird flu virus, known as H5N1, that had recently arrived in North America. Over the months that followed, the virus raced through the region, killing tens of thousands<\/a> of northern gannets.<\/p>\n

The carnage was \u201cdevastating,\u201d Dr. Avery-Gomm said. \u201cYou have to harden your heart to work on this kind of scale of mortality.\u201d<\/p>\n

Since a new version of H5N1 emerged in 2020, scientists have become increasingly concerned that the virus might set off the next pandemic, infecting people around the globe. But for the world\u2019s wild birds, the prospect of a deadly, uncontained outbreak is not theoretical. The virus has already decimated avian populations around the globe, with body counts that can sometimes be staggering: an estimated 24,000 Cape cormorants<\/a> killed in South Africa, more than 57,000 pelicans reported dead<\/a> in Peru.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe scale of the mortalities is truly unprecedented,\u201d said Johanna Harvey, an avian disease ecologist at the University of Maryland. \u201cThere\u2019s nothing comparable historically.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

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Scientists are concerned that the H5N1 virus could set off another human pandemic. But it is already putting species under pressure in the wild.Every spring, more than 200,000 northern gannets \u2014 stocky seabirds with dazzling white feathers \u2014 journey to the coast of eastern Canada. There, they blanket oceanside cliffs and rocky outcroppings, breeding in enormous colonies before flying back south for the winter.But in May 2022, as many females were getting ready to lay their eggs, the birds began dying in droves. \u201cThousands of northern gannets started to wash up on our shores,\u201d said Stephanie Avery-Gomm, a seabird biologist and research scientist at Environment and Climate Change Canada.The culprit: a bird flu virus, known as H5N1, that had recently arrived in North America. Over the months that followed, the virus raced through the region, killing tens of thousands of northern gannets.The carnage was \u201cdevastating,\u201d Dr. Avery-Gomm said. \u201cYou have to harden your heart to work on this kind of scale of mortality.\u201dSince a new version of H5N1 emerged in 2020, scientists have become increasingly concerned that the virus might set off the next pandemic, infecting people around the globe. But for the world\u2019s wild birds, the prospect of a deadly, uncontained outbreak is not theoretical. The virus has already decimated avian populations around the globe, with body counts that can sometimes be staggering: an estimated 24,000 Cape cormorants killed in South Africa, more than 57,000 pelicans reported dead in Peru.\u201cThe scale of the mortalities is truly unprecedented,\u201d said Johanna Harvey, an avian disease ecologist at the University of Maryland. \u201cThere\u2019s nothing comparable historically.\u201dWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and\u00a0log into\u00a0your Times account, or\u00a0subscribe\u00a0for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber?\u00a0Log in.Want all of The Times?\u00a0Subscribe.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":18300,"comment_status":"close","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18298","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18298","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=18298"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18298\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18301,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18298\/revisions\/18301"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/18300"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=18298"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=18298"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=18298"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}