For the first time, in wild American minks living in Spain, discovered a coronavirus infection, writes the newspaper Periodico.
Before this, SARS-CoV-2 in minks in the country was registered only on farms. In the summer of 2020, SARS-CoV-2 was detected on a farm in the municipality of Puebla de Valverde (autonomous community of Aragon), then the virus was detected in 87% of the animals. The local government decided to destroy more than 90 thousand minks. And already in January, the coronavirus was detected on a mink breeding farm in the Spanish province of La Coruna, which is part of the autonomous community of Galicia; all the animals on the farm were also eliminated.
The Ministry of Agriculture of Valencia told about the detection of COVID-19 in two dead wild minks. Local authorities are convinced that there is no risk of human transmission of the virus.
The American mink is an invasive (spread as a result of human activity) species for Spain. Quite often, animals find themselves in the wild, escaping from breeding farms. As a precautionary measure, the capture of these animals was put on pause for the safety of workers.
Coronavirus infection has been repeatedly found on mink farms. There are known infection cases in Denmark, the Netherlands, Spain, Italy, Sweden, the United States, Poland, and Lithuania.