YLE: About 70,000 animals at fur farms to be culled over bird flu concerns

THREE FUR FARMS in Finland have been ordered to cull altogether 70,000 animals in a bid to prevent the spread of the avian influenza, reports YLE.

The Finnish Food Authority on Tuesday said it has ordered all farms where bird-flu infections have been detected to cull all their minks on grounds that minks are physiologically susceptible to contracting both the avian and regular influenza and, as a result, able to function as an intermediary host where the avian flu mutates into a strain that can transmit to humans.