Thought of the Day - June 12 - Mink

Just when you thought it could not get any worse, as you may have seen there has been significant outbreak of SARS-CoV-2 infection in mink farms in the Netherlands.

Culling has already started to prevent a “reservoir” of SARS-CoV-2 virus on farms, which could endanger public health. "Infected mink don’t necessarily develop signs of disease, making them potential silent sources of the pandemic virus" said Arjan Stegeman, a veterinary epidemiologist at Utrecht University who is investigating the outbreak.

The outbreaks began around April 19, when signs of respiratory disease were reported among mink on two farms located near each other in the province of Noord-Brabant, close to the Belgian border. The detection of the virus on nine farms owned by seven companies was the result of nationwide surveillance ordered by the government. "The Netherlands has 127 mink farms, raising an average of about 5,000 adult mink" Stegeman said.

I really didn't even know there was still a significant "mink industry". So I did a little digging. Denmark is the leading producer of mink (at 28%), closely followed by China (at 24%), Netherlands is number 3 and Poland number 4, USA number 5 and guess who is number 6 in the world in mink farming - you got it, we are.

Canada's $50M mink industry had 98 mink farms in 2018. Well guess what, either their will be soon be hundreds more rural-community folk unemployed or, given places like PEI seem to be COIVD-free, we might quite quickly move up a number of spots. Only time will tell.

Cheers

Cliff