#19,329
Last month, in That Touch of Mink Flu (H5N1 in Utah Edition), we looked at the latest report of an avian flu virus detected in 7 captive (presumably farmed, but details are scant) mink here in the United States.
This time, the viral culprit was avian H5N1, but over the years we've followed numerous reports of zoonotic pathogens detected on fur farms, with some even spilling over into humans.
While mink are most frequently cited, fox, raccoon dogs, and rabbits are also farmed. Some early reports include:
- As far back as 1984, a large outbreak in Swedish mink farms was found to be due to the H10N4 avian virus.
- In 2006 CIDRAP reported on a European mink found infected with an aggressive form of the H5 flu virus in the Blekinge region of southern Sweden near where H5N1 had been detected in wild birds.
- In 2007, an antigenically distinct H3N2 Swine Influenza was detected in Canadian Mink, reported in a 2009 Journal of Clinical Microbiology study called Characterization of a Canadian Mink H3N2 Influenza A Virus Isolate Genetically Related to Triple Reassortant Swine Influenza Virus.
- In 2009's That Touch Of Mink Flu, at least 11 mink farms in the Holstebro municipality of Denmark were reported to be infected with a variant of the human H3N2 virus.
- 2017's That Touch Of Mink Flu (H9N2) - Revisited looked at the spread of LPAI H9N2 in mink.
This prompted authorities to order the depopulation of 17 million mink (see Denmark Orders Culling Of All Mink Following Discovery Of Mutated Coronavirus), to temporarily lock down North Jutland (where most of the human cases had been identified) and led to some countries banning travel to and from Denmark.
Alarms were raised again in the fall of 2022 when H5N1 began spreading rapidly through a large mink farm in Spain (see Eurosurveillance: HPAI A(H5N1) Virus Infection in Farmed Minks, Spain, October 2022).
This mink-derived H5N1 virus from Spain carried a rare mutation (PB2-T271A), which is believed to `enhance the polymerase activity of influenza A viruses in mammalian host cells and mice'. In 2023 the CDC issued an IRAT Risk Assessment On Mink Variant of Avian H5N1, finding its scores had risen in 6 of the 10 parameters used to evaluate their zoonotic potential.
The following year (2023) Finland's fur industry was hit unusually hard by HPAI H5N1, with more than 70 fur farms infected, and > 500,000 animals culled, prompting Finland's Institute for Health and Welfare (THL) to warn `Avian influenza poses a risk to public health – improvements to health security needed at fur farms'.
During the height of this outbreak, we looked at an excellent opinion piece (see PNAS: Mink Farming Poses Risks for Future Viral Pandemics) penned by two well known virologists from the UK (Professor Wendy Barclay & Tom Peacock) on why fur farms - and mink farms in particular - are high risk venues for flu.
Since then we've seen several other notable outbreaks, including SFTS in Chinese Farmed Mink and a reassorted swine and human-origin H3N2 in Canadian farmed mink. Many farms, and governments, are reluctant to provide details on outbreaks, and so we are likely only seeing the tip of the iceberg.
All of which brings us to a commentary, published two weeks ago in The Lancet Regional Health: Europe, which calls upon the EU to ban fur farming due to the public health risks they pose.While some EU countries have taken steps to phase out or ban fur farming, the industry continues in many parts of the world, including China, Russia, the United States, Canada and parts of the EU.
If the EU is serious about One Health, it must ban fur farming
Joanna Swabea Send email to jswabe@humaneworld.org ∙ Chris Walzerb,c ∙ Benjamin Roched,e ∙ Arnaud Fontanetf ∙ Thijs Kuikeng ∙ Manon Lounnasd ∙ et al.
Received August 4, 2026; Accepted August 20, 2026; Published August 29, 2026
DOI: 10.1016/j.lanepe.2026.101848 External Link
Copyright: © 2026 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier Ltd.
User License: Creative Commons Attribution – NonCommercial – NoDerivs (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0) | Elsevier's open access license policy
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The One Health approach, which recognises the fundamental interconnectedness of human wellbeing with that of other animals and the environment, is a keystone of the European Union’s health policy.1 While the prevention of zoonotic diseases, including pandemics, is a core objective of this policy, the European Commission paradoxically seems reluctant to take decisive action to address one of the highest risk sources within its borders precisely at the moment when it finally can do so.
Specifically, the Commission is currently considering legislation to ban fur farming in the EU, prompted by a 2023 European Citizens’ Initiative on the issue that had the support of more than 1.5 million EU citizens.2 A decision was due by March 2026, but the Commission has thus far delayed issuing one. There are indications that it may instead propose minimum welfare standards for the intensive production of fur-producing animals.2 However, doing so would be a grave mistake for animals and humans alike.
Fur farming is a niche industry producing non-essential luxury products, yet it poses a threat to human health. It is an avoidable anthropogenic system that concentrates large numbers of genetically homogeneous, susceptible wild fur-bearing animals in close confinement creating the conditions that favour the introduction, amplification, adaptation and spillover of pathogens to humans (spillover being the transmission of a pathogen from one vertebrate species to another).3 Once a pathogen is introduced to captive animals on these farms (whether from humans, contaminated feed, or from wildlife attracted to the farms), it can spread easily and eventually infect humans working on these farms.3
Fur farms have already been implicated in serious outbreaks in multiple countries across Europe. In 2020, for example, mink became infected with SARS-CoV-2 on multiple mink farms in the Netherlands, with subsequent “spillback” of SARS-CoV-2 from mink into humans.4 SARS-CoV-2 outbreaks were also identified on 290 mink farms in Denmark, resulting in hundreds of COVID-19 cases in humans caused by mink variant strains.5 The Danish government responded by culling the country’s entire farmed mink population — 17 million animals — while compensating mink farmers over €3 billion for their losses.6,7 It also suspended mink farming activities, but these have since resumed.
Lessons learned?
The lesson learned from COVID-19 was not that more surveillance could make fur farms safe, but rather that surveillance documented the predictable consequences of a production system that facilitates pathogen introduction, amplification and adaptation. This cyclical reactive response followed by a return to business as usual reflects a pervasive global health security framework that is unsustainable. One Health is fundamentally about investing upstream, reducing the conditions that give rise to disease emergence rather than continually paying for downstream surveillance and response, after damage is already done. Continuing to invest public resources in managing risks generated by an economically failing niche industry is difficult to reconcile with the EU’s preventive One Health ambitions.7
Outbreaks of highly pathogenic avian influenza A(H5N1) have also affected fur farms. In 2023, infections were confirmed on multiple fur farms in Finland, likely introduced to captive animals from wild birds.8 Spain also recorded an H5N1 outbreak on a mink farm in 2022, with possible viral mutation on the farm.9 An especially concerning aspect of influenza in mink is that they are susceptible to influenza viruses originating from both birds and humans. They can therefore serve as a host in which genetic reassortment occurs, which is a known route for the evolution of influenza viruses that can cause pandemics.3
These outbreaks have accelerated the decline of the EU fur farming industry. By 2024, fur production had dropped to an annual low of 6.3 million pelts, corresponding to €183 million in sales — a decline of 92% compared with the previous decade.7 Meanwhile, the industry costs European society approximately €446 million per year after accounting for its environmental and public health consequences.7 Consumers and fashion brands are also turning away from fur, and 24 (out of 27) EU Member States have already enacted production bans or restrictions on fur farming.7
The public moral concerns about the welfare of animals on fur farms, which precipitated these restrictions, are also well-founded. Indeed, the European Food Safety Authority concluded through an independent scientific investigation that, in the current caged fur farming system, the most serious adverse welfare consequences for mink, foxes, raccoon dogs and chinchillas cannot be prevented or substantially mitigated in the majority of cases.10 It is highly doubtful that changing cage dimensions, introducing enrichment requirements or inspection regimes will achieve meaningful animal welfare improvements. What it certainly will not do is remove the core epidemiological hazards posed by fur farming, namely keeping large numbers of captive bred-wild mammals in intensive systems where viruses can circulate and evolve.
If the European Commission intends to do more than merely pay lip service to One Health, it must accept accountability and take action before the next zoonotic crisis occurs. Banning fur farming would demonstrate what effective One Health policy looks like in practice: eliminating an avoidable anthropogenic source of zoonotic disease risk, while responding to citizens' concerns, thereby establishing Europe as a global leader in upstream pandemic prevention.
The concern, particularly with high density animal farms, is that it provides the virus with an ideal environment to spread from mammal to mammal. Long chains of infection (see graphic below) can provide the virus with additional opportunities to adapt to a new host species, furthering its evolution.
Admittedly, the next pandemic could arise from any farmed livestock (poultry, swine, cattle, etc.), or even from the wild. We can never truly pandemic-proof our world.
But fur farming practices are arguably more conducive to the generation and spread of zoonotic viruses, as mink are highly susceptible to influenza and coronaviruses, and it is common in many countries to feed raw poultry or poultry meat products to mink raised in captivity.
Whether we can summon the political will to do something about this threat remains to be seen.
