Phillip Island penguins to be vaccinated for bird flu

Phillip Island penguins to be rounded up for bird flu vaccine In short: Victorian authorities are planning to round up 5,000 little penguins over several weeks to vaccinate them against H5N1 bird flu. Birds need two doses of the vaccine for effective coverage, with about 1,500 doses acquired nationally so far by the federal government. What's next? More states and territories are expected to nominate priority threatened species for vaccination against bird flu. Thousands of little penguins from Phillip Island will be herded into a pen to receive a bird flu vaccine as cases of H5N1 continue to climb in Australia. Victorian authorities said it would be the largest vaccination of wild birds globally. There have been more than 200 confirmed cases of the virus in Australia. About 60 of those cases are in Victoria, which is also home to the world's biggest little penguin colony with about 40,000 animals. Worst-case scenario modelling has suggested penguin deaths could range between 8,000 to 16,000 in the instance of a six-week outbreak on Phillip Island. The strain of bird flu present in Australia has killed millions of chickens and wild birds such as penguins around the world in the past five years. Victoria's chief biodiversity officer James Todd said up to 5,000 little penguins would be vaccinated in coming weeks. Penguins are particularly at risk to getting the virus because of how close they live together. "They are a colony species that nest together. They're a seabird that will come in contact with other seabirds that carry the virus," Mr Todd said. Wildlife vaccinations require two doses, with teams needing to intercept penguins during their daily migrations in Phillip Island and St Kilda. Phillip Island Nature Parks chief executive Catherine Basterfield said the penguins would be corralled into a small pen, where a vaccine would be administered and a microchip implanted. "For each little penguin, the process is actually quite quick. They will be handled for a very short period of time and moved on," she said. Vaccines purchased from overseas Victoria will need 10,000 doses to meet its vaccine target, and plans to work with the federal government to secure them. The injectable vaccine requires three to four weeks between each shot, according to veterinary epidemiologist Debbie Eagles, the director of the Australian Centre for Disease Preparedness (ACDP). Dr Eagles said the vaccine, which was initially developed for poultry, would not be for broadscale use. "Unfortunately, we won't be able to vaccinate large numbers of wild birds,"she said. "It's very much going to be targeted at those species that are under threat and … can be caught to be vaccinated." CSIRO ran trials last year on the safety of giving the vaccine to small native birds. Other states and territories will nominate priority species for vaccination to federal authorities. Vaccines have been purchased, as part of a $2 million national program, from overseas. The focus of those vaccination programs is expected to be on captive animals that can easily be recaptured for a second dose. Dr Eagles said there were no specific plans yet to vaccinate pinniped animals such as sea lions and seals, which are some of Australia's highest-risk species. In North America there have been trials using a cattle vaccine in elephant and monk seals to test its effectiveness. "There's no specific vaccines for pinniped," Dr Eagles said. "We are in the fortunate position that we're a number of years behind other countries in terms of their own responses, which allows us the opportunity to learn from others' trials, be that for vaccinations or the situations that we're dealing with." ACDP scientists are also unaware of any development of vaccines specifically for marsupials. All local bird flu spread so far linked to Heard Island So far the spread of H5N1 among local birds such as greater crested terns, seagulls and magpies has been restricted to New South Wales, Victoria and South Australia, with the most cases in the latter two jurisdictions. Matthew Neave, who is in charge of sequencing viruses at the ACDP, said one or a small number of introductions appeared to have led to the spread in Victoria and SA. "This is just based on predictions on the genomes that we have available to us," Dr Neave said. "But because they're all so similar, it does appear to be just sort of one introduction of it that's then spread into that local population." Dr Neave said overall there had been about six or seven separate introductions of the virus into Australia. Those instances were all traced and likely to have come from Heard Island and McDonald Islands, about 4,000km south-west of the country. "This is certainly an underestimate of the true number of incursions that have happened to Australia," Dr Neave said. ACDP scientists have also been keeping a close eye on any potential mutations that could make the virus circulating in Australia a greater risk to humans or other mammal species. Dr Eagles said the risk of transmission from birds to humans remained low. Senior research scientist Frank Wong said the risk of the strain in Australia infecting cattle, which happened in the US, was also low. "You would need … an ecological perfect storm for the virus to spill over and impact livestock," he said.