REVIEW - Animals Infected With SARS-COV-2 Strain That Causes COVID May Pose Greater Risk To Humans

BRUSSELS (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 21st November, 2020) Animals, from pet cats and dogs to minks, have been infected with the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-COV-2), the coronavirus strain responsible for the ongoing pandemic, prompting debates on whether infected animals pose greater risks for humans.

Denmark has ordered the culling of all minks in the country after a unique mutation of the strain was detected, while several other countries have confirmed cases of SARS-COV-2 at mink farms as well.

The hypothesis that the unique COVID-19 strain found in minks may weaken human antibodies and potentially undermine the global efforts to develop a vaccine prompted Copenhagen to make the difficult decision to slaughter all potential hosts, a move harshly condemned by animal rights organizations.

In Denmark, the first cases of SARS-CoV-2 among minks were reported in June 2020. Since then, 214 people have been infected with SARS-CoV-2 associated with the mink farms, including twelve with the unique variant. Five other countries, including the United States, the Netherlands, Sweden, Spain and Italy, have confirmed SARS-COV-2 cases in farmed minks.

The World Health Organization (WHO) has said that the unique variant, referred to as the "cluster 5," demonstrates a "combination of mutations or genetic changes that have not been observed before."

"Preliminary findings indicate that this particular mink-associated variant identified in both minks and the 12 human cases has moderately decreased sensitivity to neutralizing antibodies," the WHO said in a press release on November 6.

All 12 cases were identified in September 2020 in the North Jutland province of Denmark. People aged between 7 to 79 have been infected. Eight of them are linked to the mink farming industry, while four others have been identified among the local population.

The presence of the strain on many mink farms in Denmark raises fears that these animals may spread this unique mutation. SARS-COV-2 cases among minks represent the risk of accidental contamination to farmers, and subsequently to the local population.

There is also the possibility that SARS-COV-2 adapted to minks could cross the species barrier and infect other animals, including cats.

Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen has announced that up to 17 million minks across the country would be culled as a precautionary measure. The Danish Health Ministry confirmed that the "mutated variant" posed risks to the effectiveness of potential coronavirus vaccines.

Danish authorities have imposed local lockdowns in seven towns in North Jutland to prevent the spread of the infection.

On Thursday, the Health Ministry announced that the unique mutation was "very likely extinct," as the cluster 5 cases have not been detected since September 15. Targeted restrictions in the province were then lifted.

"No other case of the mutation from minks, Cluster 5, has been detected since September 15, which is why the Institute in charge of infectious diseases [Statens Serum Institut, SSI] considers that this mutation is very probably extinct," the ministry said in a statement.

During the early stages of the global pandemic, many reports emerged suggesting that pangolins were intermediary hosts in the transmission of SARS-COV-2 to humans. However, there is no credible evidence to confirm such a theory.

Meanwhile, the COVID-19 mink variant could be dangerous for China as well as the country has more than 1,000 industrial mink farms that house from 10,000 to 50,000 animals each. Annually, China culls 23 million minks for fur production. Such numbers are comparable to the production of the US, Denmark, the Netherlands and Poland combined.

These countries exchange technologies, genetically selected breeders and marketing spots with Beijing.

China, which has decided to limit the fur production, grants its partners customs facilities in this sector and supports American and Danish businesses through its imports driven by domestic demand for luxury clothing.

In addition, it should be noted that Chinese farms, often private, may belong to foreign owners. At the same time, Chinese private equity funds own thousands of acres of Danish land, as well as intensive livestock operations.

The business of breeding wild animals in China employs tens of thousands of people and 75 percent of it is linked to the fur market. Beijing has reclassified minks, raccoons and foxes as "domestic species" after authorities announced the suspension of captive breeding of wild animals at the early stages of the pandemic.

EXPERT OPINION ON THREATS RELATED TO INFECTED ANIMALS

First cases of COVID-19 in mink farms were detected in late April in the Netherlands. In May, Marion Koopmans and her scientific teams at the Erasmus Institute in Rotterdam established that the coronavirus had passed at least twice from minks to farmers.

These findings prompted Dutch health authorities to order the culling of one million minks in dozens of farms within the next few weeks. The Dutch parliament then declared the suspension of fur trading in the country.

David Alsteens, a professor at the Institute of Biomolecular Science in Belgium's Leuven and a specialist in viruses, has said that mutations may weaken antibodies.

"This is not my area of research, but you have to know that there are masses of viruses that are mutating all the time and are in contact with humans. I am thinking, for example, of the rotaviruses, which make mutations in humans that can prevent recognition by vaccines or antibodies," Alsteens told Sputnik.

Meanwhile, Jean Ruelle, a virologist at the Institute for Experimental and Clinical Research at the UCLouvain university in Belgium, has said that surveillance of inter-species transmission is essential as mutations can be unpredictable.

"Inter-species transmission, including the human species, remains an unpredictable event. We have seen with avian flu that an animal virus (present in bird populations) has changed and adapted to humans, without degenerating into a pandemic. We have just detected the presence of this virus again in the avian fauna on the coast of the North Sea, for example. Surveillance and vigilance remain essential, even if there are not even dozens of transmissions to humans," Ruelle told Sputnik.

The expert added that the coronavirus mutates not as fast as the flu, meaning that a hypothesis that a unique mink variant may lead to another pandemic will most likely be rejected.

"The coronavirus is somehow less of a concern than the flu. It mutates less quickly. But since there are millions of contaminations in the world, mutations are inevitable and these variants can be cross-reactive with the first variant. These are subtle but very real changes in the genetic code or reproduction of the virus. However, the hypothesis of the development of a second pandemic parallel to the first by a mutant virus, for example caused by a variant that 'escaped' from a mink farm, is unlikely in the case of the coronavirus," Ruelle said.

The researcher linked the emergence of the new mutation to the fact that many minks were kept in small cases very close to each other and said that the unique variant will not become a challenge to the development of vaccines.