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While the last posted update on South Australia's bird flu status appears to be 3 days ago, on Sept 10th, SA's environment minister Emily Bourke announced the death of an endangered Australian sea lion due to H5N1 in the press conference above.
The sea lion recovered from Seal Bay on Kangaroo island - which was being cared for after a shark attack - reportedly died from the virus.
Location Kangaroo Island - Credit Wikipedia
Kangaroo Island is home to a number of marine mammals which are known to be susceptible to avian flu (see Preprint: Mass mortality of southern elephant seals during multi-species outbreak of HPAI H5N1 on sub-Antarctic Heard Island), including:- Australian sea lion.
- Australian fur seal.
- New Zealand fur seal.
- Bottlenose dolphin and common dolphin.
While Australia's reporting on avian flu has changed; counting events rather than individual H5-positive tests, the numbers continue to rise steadily.
So far, the virus has not been reported in poultry or other livestock, but the risks to australia's fauna remains high, and only a fraction of the nearly 42,000 hotline reports have been investigated.
