Covid-19: Too early to judge if mutation in mink can impact vaccine, WHO chief scientist

Chief Scientist at World Health Organization Soumya Swaminathan on Friday, vember 6 said that it was too early to decide if coronavirus mutation found in farmed mink population of Denmark could impact vaccine. mutated version of COVID-19 was detected at mink farms in Denmark's rth Jutland region, following which authorities h ordered culling of animals. analysis conducted by Danish State Serum Institute and Danish government confirmed presence of virus among farm’s mink. 

Covid-19 mutation due to mink

During a virtual press briefing, Swaminathan said, “We need to wait and see what implications are, but I don’t think we should come to any conclusions about wher this particular mutation is going to impact vaccine efficacy or t. We don’t have any evidence at moment that it would”. Denmark has said that it might need to kill upto 17 million minks over fear of new mutation that may spre back to humans. In August, Dutch government decided to bring an early end to mink farming in country as lawmakers vanced deline by three years. However, y decided that it was justified to let infected animals survive because risk of spreing infection to humans seemed minimal. It was in late September when cases at Danish mink farms soared.

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According to reports by ANI, Maria Van Kerkhove, Covid-19 Technical Le at WHO Health Emergencies Programme said, “In this situation, re is a suggestion that some of se mutations may have some implications, but we need to do proper studies to evaluate this. and that is ongoing right w with colleagues at SSI in Denmark as well as our international working group”. She ded, “As this virus continues to circulate globe, as we see it in mink, in different populations, those sequences need to be shared because y need to be evaluated, y need to be studied, y need to be discussed”. 

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Recently, Danish government has imposed a tougher lockdown in parts of country where a new strain of coronavirus was discovered in minks population. Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen anunced closure of schools and public transport, where most of se affected mink farms are located, encouraging people to stay where y are and get tested. According to reports, 17 million minks will be culled as a result of latest discovery. mink skin industry is one of biggest contributors to Denmark's ecomy as it is country's third-biggest agricultural export. Earlier this year, over 1 million minks were culled after COVID-19 cases were reported from and around 400 farms in Denmark. 

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(Im Credits: PTI/RepresentativeIm)