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Just weeks after Denmark ordered the culling of 17 million farmed minks to stop the spread of COVID-19, a mink in Utah has become the first known wild animal to contract the coronavirus in the U.S., officials said.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture confirmed the case of COVID-19 in the small mammal after experts at the USDA National Veterinary Services Laboratories (NVSL) performed a real-time RT-PCR test and nasal swab.
"To our knowledge, this is the 1st free-ranging, native wild animal confirmed with SARS-CoV-2," the USDA wrote in a statement.
In this file photo dated Friday, Nov. 6, 2020, mink look out from a pen on a farm near Naestved, Denmark. (Mads Claus Rasmussen/Ritzau Scanpix via AP)
As such, the World Organization for Animal Health has been notified of the detection in the mink, which was done as part of a larger "epidemiological study in the surrounding area of the infected farm," the agency added.
Several other wildlife species were tested, including minks, but all tested negative for COVID-19.
In November, officials in Denmark became concerned after minks that were culled to stop the spread of the virus turned into "zombies" due to gases building up in their decomposed bodies.
In October, researchers became concerned that the narwhal, described as "the unicorn of the sea" for its long tusk, could be at risk to the virus, given they are "particularly susceptible to infection.”
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the risk of animals spreading the virus "is considered to be low," but there has been evidence of animals getting the virus.
A tiger at the Bronx Zoo tested positive for coronavirus, Fox News reported in April. The first dog infected with the virus in the U.S., a German shepherd, died in July.
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Fox News' Julia Musto contributed to this story.
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