This story initially appeared in The Guardian and is a part of the Climate Desk collaboration.
Avian flu has reached the Antarctic, elevating considerations for remoted populations of penguins and seals which have by no means been uncovered to the lethal H5N1 virus earlier than. The complete influence of the virus’s arrival is just not but recognized, however scientists are elevating considerations about potential “catastrophic breeding failure” of the area’s fragile wildlife populations.
The virus was present in populations of a scavenging hen referred to as brown skua on Fowl Island, which is a part of the British abroad territory of South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands. These migratory birds in all probability introduced it with them from South America the place hen flu is widespread and has already killed an estimated 500,000 seabirds and 20,000 sea lions in Chile and Peru alone.
The present outbreak of the extremely infectious variant of H5N1—which began in 2021—is estimated to have killed hundreds of thousands of untamed birds. Researchers have lengthy been involved about its potential influence on Antarctic wildlife, as a result of many species are discovered nowhere else on this planet, and usually are not recognized to have been uncovered to hen flu viruses earlier than.
Researchers from the British Antarctic Survey (BAS) took swabs of the birds after they discovered unexplained mortality and despatched them for testing in the UK.
Ashley Bennison, the BAS science supervisor for Fowl Island, stated: “This can be a significantly unhappy occasion to substantiate. We’ll proceed to observe the species on the island as finest as we are able to and maintain the science going, however we’re uncertain of the complete influence in the meanwhile.”
Fowl Island is taken into account one of many planet’s richest wildlife sites, dwelling to many endangered hen species in addition to 50,000 pairs of breeding penguins and 65,000 pairs of fur seals. The island lies simply off the northwest tip of South Georgia, about 600 miles south-east of the Falkland Islands.
A risk assessment on the impacts of hen flu reaching the continent, revealed by Scientific Committee on Antarctic Analysis, stated fur seals, sea lions, skuas and gulls have been probably the most in danger, adopted by penguins, birds of prey, sheathbills and large petrels.
Dr. Meagan Dewar, the chair of the Antarctic Wildlife Well being Community—who was the lead creator of the report—stated that the illness may end in “catastrophic breeding failure” within the area, with a “devastating influence on many wildlife species.”
The report states that “ongoing illness surveillance programmes ought to be established to determine new and rising pathogens.”
H5N1 unfold virtually 4,000 miles down South America within the house of three months, facilitated by migration routes of untamed birds. The actual fact it had already unfold down South America made it doubtless it will arrive in South Georgia in some unspecified time in the future, researchers say.
Because of the optimistic assessments on Fowl Island, most subject work that entails animal dealing with has been suspended. Workers should be further vigilant about guaranteeing they’ve clear clothes and subject tools.
The information follows latest analysis that confirmed some seabirds within the UK—the place the outbreak was first reported—are beginning to show immunity to H5N1.
