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The plight and role of wild birds in the current bird flu panzootic

Nature Ecology & Evolution volume 7, pages 1541–1542 (2023)Cite this article

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Although the reported scale of poultry mortality due to HPAI H5N1 2.3.4.4b is probably aligned to reality, the 75,106 wild bird casualties reported in WAHIS are not. WAHIS is the most comprehensive and only global source of information pertaining to poultry and wild bird case numbers. However, despite these data being used for response planning, the collation of case data are not within its design. As such, case data reporting is inconsistent and it may include all observed carcasses, only those tested and confirmed, or no information on numbers at all. For instance, the outbreaks comprising 24,463 Cape cormorants (Phalacrocorax capensis) in South Africa and 9,029 common cranes (Grus grus) in Israel appear to be reported in full. More widespread is the reporting of only fractions of cases compared to what is stated in the media2 or in publications. For example, in the WAHIS database there are 35 HPAI notifications since 1 October 2021 for Sandwich terns (Thalasseus sandvicensis) that involve 61 individuals globally. This contrasts sharply with reports of more than 20,000 Sandwich tern carcasses in Europe3. Similarly, 47 dead great skuas (Stercorarius skua) have been reported to WAHIS, whereas 1,400 dead individuals were found on the Scottish island of Foula alone4. Finally, in some cases, outbreaks are reported only in the literature and not in WAHIS, such as the 2,140 great white pelicans (Pelecanus onocrotalus) found dead in Mauritania in 2021 (ref. 5).

Humans report outbreaks and the correlation between the distribution of wildlife cases reported and human population density strongly suggests the potential for vast underreporting in sparsely populated areas (Fig. 1d). Combined with the high underreporting of outbreaks in areas where human population densities are high (for example, the case of the Sandwich terns), this suggests that only a fraction of outbreaks in wildlife have been detected and appropriately reported. This means that the number of wild birds affected is entirely unknown but is certainly more than the tens of thousands that have been reported and collated in WAHIS.

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Fig. 1: Key features of the current HPAI panzootic.

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Acknowledgements

M.K. is funded by Australian Research Council (ARC) Discovery Project Grant DP19010186. M.W. is funded by an ARC Discovery Early Career Research Award DE200100977. The WHO Collaborating Centre for Reference and Research on Influenza is funded by the Australian Department of Health. We thank P. Tizzani (World Organisation for Animal Health) for assisting with data retrieval.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Centre for Integrative Ecology, School of Life and Environmental Sciences, Deakin University, Geelong, Victoria, Australia

    Marcel Klaassen

  2. Sydney Institute for Infectious Diseases, School of Life and Environmental Sciences and School of Medical Sciences, The University of Sydney, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia

    Michelle Wille

  3. Centre for Pathogen Genomics, Department of Microbiology and Immunology, The University of Melbourne, at the Peter Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia

    Michelle Wille

  4. WHO Collaborating Centre for Reference and Research on Influenza at the Peter Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia

    Michelle Wille

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Correspondence to Marcel Klaassen or Michelle Wille.

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Klaassen, M., Wille, M. The plight and role of wild birds in the current bird flu panzootic. Nat Ecol Evol 7, 1541–1542 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41559-023-02182-x

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