More than 17,000 southern elephant seal pups, about 95% of the total number of seals born last year, died on Argentina’s Valdez Peninsula from a highly contagious strain of the virus. H5N1, or bird flu. According to publications V Live Sciencean outbreak of avian influenza has been confirmed by the Argentine Government Animal Health Service (SENASA), and against this background, suspicions arose among environmentalists and scientists that the virus had mutated and was able to transmit from mammal to mammal.
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According to the researchers, a catastrophic jump in mortality among elephant seal pups occurred in November last year. It is noted that their young are born between September and November and remain with their mother for the next three weeks.
Scientists obtained data from three zones on the Valdez Peninsula, which includes about 500 kilometers of coastline. Experts found that 96% of the cubs of this species in the studied areas died. According to scientists, about 18 thousand new individuals were born in 2022, which suggests that almost the entire young population was lost.
Researchers do not yet know how the disease affects adults, but their research work, presented in Marine Mammal Science, states that on one of the densely populated beaches, 46 deaths were recorded among adult elephant seals, although even one such death is rare in a year. Scientists explain the incident by the transmission of the virus from mammal to mammal, which could have happened when the disease was transmitted from sea lions to elephant seals.
2024-01-24 09:16:00
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