On June 25th, the Finnish health authorities announced that the country plans to start administering avian influenza vaccines as early as next week for some workers who come into contact with animals.
Chicken farm.
Finland will be the first country in the world to implement this initiative.
According to the European Commission (EC), Finland has purchased avian influenza vaccines for 10,000 people. This initiative is part of a broader plan by the European Union (EU) to procure 40 million doses of the vaccine from the manufacturer CSL Seqirus to be distributed to 15 member states.
The Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare (THL) stated that the vaccine will be used for individuals aged 18 and older who are at high risk of contracting avian influenza due to their work or other reasons.
In recent years, the H5N1 avian influenza strain has caused hundreds of millions of poultry to die or be culled globally and is increasingly spreading to mammals, including cattle herds in the United States.
Some human infection cases have also been reported. However, according to THL, no cases of this virus have been detected in humans in Finland. The country aims to implement the vaccination to mitigate the risk of transmission from poultry farms.
In 2023, fur farms in Finland, primarily operating outdoors, had to cull approximately 485,000 animals to prevent the virus from spreading among livestock and to humans.
