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- ‘A genuine wildlife emergency’: everything you need to know about the arrival of H5 bird flu in Australia | Environment | The Guardian
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Petra StockSun 21 Jun 2026 02.11 EDTShare
A deadly strain of bird flu, known as H5 bird flu, has arrived on the Australian mainland.
The federal agriculture minister, Julie Collins, this weekend confirmed that a brown skua – that had been found sick in Western Australia – had died from the H5N1 virus. The skua is a wild migratory bird.
A second bird, a sick giant petrel found nearby, was also likely infected.
Australia’s run as the only continent free of the virus has now ended. H5 bird flu has killed millions of birds and thousands of marine mammals since it began spreading across the globe in 2021.
Exposing the Big Game 