Confusion about radical mink killing: “We made a mistake”



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In Denmark, animals were slaughtered en masse due to a corona outbreak in mink. The government now admits mistakes.

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The slaughtered minks are disposed of in a ditch.  Danish health authorities are using the Danish military to dispose of mink on military land, as the Danish Environment and Health Authority announced that the country's incineration and processing plants are struggling to keep up.

The slaughtered minks are disposed of in a ditch. Employees of the Danish health authority dispose of mink on military land with the help of the Danish armed forces, as the Danish environmental and health authority announced that the country’s incineration and processing plants are having difficulty keeping up.

Keystone / Ritzau Scanpix / AP

Mink dead in southern Jutland, Denmark: Authorities react after more than 200 people contracted mink coronavirus.

Mink dead in southern Jutland, Denmark: Authorities react after more than 200 people contracted mink coronavirus.

KEYSTONE

Mink farmer Thorbjoern Jepsen at his mink farm in Gjoel, Denmark.

Mink farmer Thorbjoern Jepsen at his mink farm in Gjoel, Denmark.

KEYSTONE

There is growing confusion in Denmark regarding the government-initiated mass culling of all mink in the country. There is still no legal basis for the killing of healthy fur animals outside some risk areas, as Food Minister Mogens Jensen admitted.

“We were wrong. There is no legal authority to ask mink farmers outside the 7.8 kilometer zones to slaughter their minks, “Jensen told TV2 on Tuesday. He didn’t know when the announcement was made, but he didn’t. changed the fact that breeding mink in Denmark in the Crown era was a risk, farmers should continue to kill animals for the sake of public health.

Has the government overreacted?

When the measure was announced last Wednesday, Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said all minks in Denmark should be killed to ensure that a coronavirus mutation that has occurred in the mink is contained. A communication from the Ministry of Environment and Food states: “Based on a new risk assessment by the health authorities, the government has decided to cull all Danish mink stocks.”

Fur farmers were offered a bonus payment if they killed their animals within days. In a new letter from the Fødevarestyrelsen food authority to Danish mink farmers, it was said on Tuesday that they regretted that an earlier letter on Friday did not indicate that it was a “request” to kill healthy stocks outside of the 7.8-month period. exchanged kilometer zones.

As reported by TV2, the law only covers infected mink farms and stocks in a certain area – it said 7.8 kilometers. The government now wants to create the legal basis with an accelerated procedure that allows even healthy minks to be killed.

(SDA)



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