On November 13, Spain’s Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food imposed the confinement of all free-range poultry farms to curb the spread of avian influenza – more commonly known as “bird flu” – caused by the H5N1 virus. This drastic, though not unprecedented, measure was justified by climbing numbers of outbreaks in Europe, as well as the heightened risk posed by the southward migration of wild birds in Europe.
This type of news understandably causes alarm among the general public, but has the risk of the H5N1 virus triggering a pandemic among humans actually increased? And why is it causing increasing devastation not only among birds, but also among many species of mammals?
