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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
Environment
Ashifa Kassam

‘Pandemic potential’: bird flu outbreaks fuelling chance of human spillover

Northern gannets rest next to a dead seabird on Rouzic Island in Brittany, western France, on 15 September 2022
Northern gannets next to a dead seabird on Rouzic Island in Brittany, France, September 2022. Bird flu has devastated wild seabird populations. Photograph: Fred Tanneau/AFP/Getty Images

Multiple waves of avian influenza have left a trail of devastation across the globe, leading to the deaths and culling of more than 300 million chickens, ducks and geese and an unknown number of wild birds between 2005 and 2021.

Today, with parts of Europe and North America in the midst of the worst outbreak on record, a global cohort of researchers is keeping cautious watch amid concerns about the impact the disease could have on humans.

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