Covid-19 spreading in animals

[brad465]

There's a report in the Financial Times today about how covid-19 is spreading among animals, in particular wild deer in the US, and an increasing number of cases identified in pets:

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on.ft.com

Two studies showing high levels of Covid-19 infection among wild deer in the US have renewed concerns about the virus spreading through animal populations.

This is the highest rated comment on this article, which I think is a beauty, although I bet some people so hooked on covid restrictions don't see it as sarcasm:



There was another one that quite simply said "Clearly, the easy solution is to mask the deer."

 

[MikeWM]

I think this was pointed out some time ago (by people who know rather more than me) as one of the reasons why an 'elimination strategy' just wasn't going to work. If a virus has 'reservoirs' in animals then it will always be able to come back.

 

[Peter Sarf]

I think this was pointed out some time ago (by people who know rather more than me) as one of the reasons why an 'elimination strategy' just wasn't going to work. If a virus has 'reservoirs' in animals then it will always be able to come back.

It came from animals so it follows that more than just the human race can get infected. We just need to continue gently adapting to Covid and in a few years time Covid will be an issue just like any other another flu.

 

[Bantamzen]

There's a report in the Financial Times today about how covid-19 is spreading among animals, in particular wild deer in the US, and an increasing number of cases identified in pets:

Subscribe to the Financial Times

A subscription to the Financial Times provides you with the insights and perspective you need to succeed, now.

on.ft.com

This is the highest rated comment on this article, which I think is a beauty, although I bet some people so hooked on covid restrictions don't see it as sarcasm:

View attachment 105831

There was another one that quite simply said "Clearly, the easy solution is to mask the deer."

You have to wonder just what some Americans have been doing in the wild for deer to be catching it......

 

[brad465]

We can now add hippos to the list of animals that have got covid:

Belgian zoo hippos test positive for Covid

Officials at Antwerp zoo do not know how the pair - now in quarantine - caught the virus.

www.bbc.co.uk

A Belgian zoo has said that its two hippopotamuses have been taken into quarantine after testing positive for coronavirus.
It is unclear how Imani, aged 14, and Hermien, 41, caught the virus, Antwerp Zoo said, adding the animals were doing well - apart from having runny noses.
Restrictions have been tightened at the zoo until the animals test negative.
Globally, there have been several reports of captive and domesticated animals infected with Sars-CoV-2.
The hippos' noses are usually wet, but vets at Antwerp Zoo decided to test the pair after they noticed they were "expelling snot".
Their enclosure has been sealed off. Their handlers - who have tested negative - must wear masks and safety glasses, and disinfect their footwear before any contact with the hippos.
"To my knowledge, it's the first recorded contamination among this species. Throughout the world this virus has mostly been seen in great apes and felines," said Antwerp Zoo vet Francis Vercammen.
Earlier this week, Canada also confirmed that three Covid cases had been discovered in wild deer - the first such report in the country's wildlife.
But limited testing means no-one knows how prevalent coronavirus is in the wild.

Something I've been saying elsewhere, on and off this forum, is that a virus that can also infect animals is practically impossible to eliminate, which explains why flu hasn't been eradicated, and why smallpox, which was only believed to have infected humans, was eradicable.

 

[Yew]

Something I've been saying elsewhere, on and off this forum, is that a virus that can also infect animals is practically impossible to eliminate, which explains why flu hasn't been eradicated, and why smallpox, which was only believed to have infected humans, was eradicable.

Some would say that is the elephant in the room...

 

[Shimbleshanks]

Three of our chickens have been poorly at intervals over the past 9 months - sitting down instead of pecking around for food, beaks open as if they were panting, generally lethargic. Eventually they got better after a week or so.
The vet was baffled as to what it was; I'm beginning to think it might have been Covid.

 

[johnnychips]

Hope you took precautions (image shows a hen in a mask)

 

[Cowley]

Hope you took precautions (image shows a hen in a mask)
View attachment 106497

 

[Yew]

I've been trying to come up with a chicken pun for an hour now, but no (c)luck.

 

[johnnychips]

When I was a kid, we visited Belle Vue zoo in Manchester, where there was a huge hippopotamus. I was fascinated by the size of its mouth. You could - and we did - throw a whole loaf into it and it would disappear without trace. Now just imagine if it had Covid, and sneezed! I wonder if the Government are taking this threat seriously.

EDIT: oops, just realised I posted this on RailUK instead of sending it to the Metro letters page, where it would have been one of the saner contributions.

 

[Bayum]

I've been trying to come up with a chicken pun for an hour now, but no (c)luck.

I had great egg-spectations reading this.

 

[Yew]

Apparently this now includes Hippos, though I would suggest that if you're within 2m of a hippo, you should probably be concerned about dangers other than covid.

 

[DelayRepay]

Apparently this now includes Hippos, though I would suggest that if you're within 2m of a hippo, you should probably be concerned about dangers other than covid.

I wonder who took the swabs?

 

[Dent]

Something I've been saying elsewhere, on and off this forum, is that a virus that can also infect animals is practically impossible to eliminate, which explains why flu hasn't been eradicated, and why smallpox, which was only believed to have infected humans, was eradicable.

Eliminating a virus in a practical timescale was never a realistic possibility anyway. Even smallpox took around 200 years to eliminate, and no other virus has been eliminated at all.

 

[Yew]

Eliminating a virus in a practical timescale was never a realistic possibility anyway. Even smallpox took around 200 years to eliminate, and no other virus has been eliminated at all.

I think there was one in Cows, but either way, it's largely irrelevant.

 

[Ediswan]

I think there was one in Cows, but either way, it's largely irrelevant.

Rinderpest.

 

[Dent]

I think there was one in Cows, but either way, it's largely irrelevant.

Is should have specified human virus, but my point still stands. It is unrealistic to eliminate any virus in any reasonable time anyway, whether or spreads to animals is academic.

 

[AndrewE]

Is should have specified human virus, but my point still stands. It is unrealistic to eliminate any virus in any reasonable time anyway, whether or spreads to animals is academic.

not just viruses: Think Tb. Humans (drug-resistant strains were/are rife throughout the ex-iron curtain countries prison system,) Cattle, Deer (massive risk as they are so mobile and no respecters of boundaries), llamas etc, not to mention badgers.
One species demonised, all the others are the elephants in the room.
Without well-planned (and funded) world-wide action on any major biological threat we might as well throw in the towel.

 

[nw1]

A 'foreign' (from another street) cat wandered into the yard today. Seems the yard will have to be decontaminated with industrial-strength disinfectant, just in case the cat had Covid.

And I'd better avoid going for walks in the woods, in case I encounter a deer...

 

[Jonny]

A 'foreign' (from another street) cat wandered into the yard today. Seems the yard will have to be decontaminated with industrial-strength disinfectant, just in case the cat had Covid.

And I'd better avoid going for walks in the woods, in case I encounter a deer...

Where I live gets several from different houses. No wonder that Covid can jump.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 9 Dec 2021 ==

This is the highest rated comment on this article, which I think is a beauty, although I bet some people so hooked on covid restrictions don't see it as sarcasm:

There is a whole Reddit group (OK Subreddit), "Church of Covid", dedicated to such satire.

 

[Peter Sarf]

A 'foreign' (from another street) cat wandered into the yard today. Seems the yard will have to be decontaminated with industrial-strength disinfectant, just in case the cat had Covid.

And I'd better avoid going for walks in the woods, in case I encounter a deer...

I bet some of these cats have been holding parties all through lockdown.

 

[nw1]

I bet some of these cats have been holding parties all through lockdown.

They certainly were last winter. Particularly a rather big, lumbering blonde tomcat, whose name escapes me right now, but was known for chastising other cats who sat down on their own by a lake with a takeaway mouse as 'virus spreaders' while he was partying with his group of elite cats.

 

[brad465]

If ever one needs an example of the covid insanity we've developed, Hong Kong are trying to rival the story about the rescue dog culling story in Australia last year, but this time with hamsters and other small mammals, because a covid outbreak in a pet shop:

Hong Kong seizes hamsters from pet store for mass cull

A pet shop outbreak in "zero Covid" Hong Kong will result in the euthanasia of 2,000 small mammals.

www.bbc.co.uk

Hong Kong plans to cull some 2,000 hamsters and other small mammals over a Covid-19 outbreak linked to a pet shop in the city.
An outbreak of the Delta variant linked to a worker in the shop prompted officials to test hundreds of animals there - with 11 hamsters positive.
Unlike many other places, Hong Kong has maintained a "zero Covid" strategy focused on eliminating the disease.
Officials said it may be an example of animal-to-human Covid transmission.
Only the hamsters at the pet shop seemed to be affected, with negative results for other animals there such as rabbits and chinchillas. But as a "preventative measure", 2,000 hamsters and other small mammals will be killed.
The animals are spread across 34 different pet shops and animal storage centres.
And any new pet owners who bought a hamster since 22 December, perhaps as a Christmas gift, will need to hand the animal over to authorities for euthanasia.
A telephone hamster hotline is being set up, and a ban on the import and sale of hamsters and other small mammals will also be enacted, agriculture officials said.

 

[nw1]

If ever one needs an example of the covid insanity we've developed, Hong Kong are trying to rival the story about the rescue dog culling story in Australia last year, but this time with hamsters and other small mammals, because a covid outbreak in a pet shop:

Hong Kong seizes hamsters from pet store for mass cull

A pet shop outbreak in "zero Covid" Hong Kong will result in the euthanasia of 2,000 small mammals.

www.bbc.co.uk

Well, given how appallingly the so called 'Communist' party has treated humans for the past 75 years, it's little surprise that they don't feel any qualms about putting down pet hamsters based on the flat-earther nonsense that is zero Covid. It's like they seriously believe they can defeat the virus by their control-freakery. Someone should tell them the story of King Canute and the tide.

 

[kristiang85]

I saw this clip earlier... https://twitter.com/BernieSpofforth/status/1483422470208118788

(Link shows a 30s video of Australians saying they are scared their pets will get COVID and believe they should be vaccinated)

 

[Cdd89]

If ever one needs an example of the covid insanity we've developed, Hong Kong are trying to rival the story about the rescue dog culling story in Australia last year, but this time with hamsters and other small mammals, because a covid outbreak in a pet shop:

I would note that it’s interesting their Omicron wave doesn’t seem to have taken off, against my predictions based on the effect of other lockdowns, and while they should probably be grateful given their low vaccination rates in the elderly, I’d love to know why.

(Even if we’re crediting their restrictions, to be clear, I absolutely don’t think they are worth it).

 

[jamesr]

I would note that it’s interesting their Omicron wave doesn’t seem to have taken off, against my predictions based on the effect of other lockdowns, and while they should probably be grateful given their low vaccination rates in the elderly, I’d love to know why.

(Even if we’re crediting their restrictions, to be clear, I absolutely don’t think they are worth it).

As someone who lives in the city, I believe the low rates of Omicron you’re seeing in the community are a direct result of the ludicrous steps the government takes when they find a case - complete solitary isolation for you, and your family, colleagues and other close contacts for at least 21 days (they have today locked up 60 school kids on this basis). No-one in their right mind in this city would volunteer to take a Covid test so I suspect cases are now out there, but going under the radar and not recorded. I wholeheartedly expect we’ll see random cases popping up here and there for weeks, and the government will come up with increasingly bizarre and random explanations for where it has come from.

I don’t think many people legitimately believe the hamster tale. It’s linked to Delta cases rather than the 50-odd Omicron cases over the past three weeks. There have been Delta cases across the border in Shenzhen. Apparently only a handful. People from Shenzhen are amongst the few who are able to enter the city without 21 days quarantine. It would be extremely difficult for the local government (who, lets face it, have their strings pulled by the big guys up north) who have been strangling the city financially in pursuit of zero-Covid to suggest that the cases came from zero-Covid Shenzhen… additionally, there’s increasing evidence that the quarantine hotels are actually spreading the virus from new arrivals to people about to be set free… someone has dreamt up the hamster rubbish as a tall tale to avoid admitting one of the more likely possibilities. Getting the population up in arms about hamsters also moves the conversation away from discussing the increasingly apparent failure of Zero Covid.

Our illustrious leaders have spent the last 2 days chasing down hamsters across the city (not just from the shop, but citywide). If only they could apply themselves to getting the elderly vaccinated, there might be some hope for the place.

Everyone who visited the pet shop has been sent off to the quarantine centre for 21 days. As someone else posted on social media the other day “I am pondering a conversation between me and my 2019 self where I have to explain that in 3 years I could be sent to a government detention camp for spending 10 mins within the proximity of a hamster“!

 

[yorkie]

I've held off posting this for a while now but as I see this thread is now active again, here goes:

COVID-19: Symptoms, incubation, prevention, and more

COVID-19 is a highly contagious infectious disease resulting from a recently identified coronavirus. Learn to curb its spread and more here.

www.medicalnewstoday.com

• The origin of the Omicron variant of SARS-CoV-2 is uncertain because it contains a large number of mutations that are rare in other known human variants.
  
  
• Scientists at the Chinese Academy of Sciences now report that they have found a pattern of mutations in Omicron that is typical of a virus that has infected mice.
  

 

[duncanp]

We can now add hippos to the list of animals that have got covid:

Belgian zoo hippos test positive for Covid

Officials at Antwerp zoo do not know how the pair - now in quarantine - caught the virus.

www.bbc.co.uk

Something I've been saying elsewhere, on and off this forum, is that a virus that can also infect animals is practically impossible to eliminate, which explains why flu hasn't been eradicated, and why smallpox, which was only believed to have infected humans, was eradicable.

I can't imagine how you would test a hippopotamus for COVID.

It is hardly likely to take kindly to someone sticking a swab up its nose or down its throat.

And you would need a pretty big swab too.

Who is going to volunteer to test the lions for COVID?

Don't all rush at once.