The Economist explains

Why Finland and others are vaccinating people against bird flu

The virus is spreading undetected in mammals

Chickens at a poultry farm in Tepatitlan, Jalisco State, Mexico
Photograph: Getty Images

WORKERS AT POULTRY and fur farms in Finland will, in the coming days, receive vaccines against bird flu. Fourteen other EU countries have signed up to procure bird-flu vaccines through a programme set up by the European Commission. America’s government has also bought vaccines in anticipation of a pandemic. And it recently commissioned Moderna, a pharmaceutical company, to create an mRNA bird-flu vaccine using a technology that was effective in protecting against covid-19. So why are countries vaccinating people against bird flu?

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