Every Australian state has now found a deadly strain of bird flu, with the sixth and final state confirming an infection on Thursday.
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August 13, 2026 – 1:56PMNewsWire1 Comment
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Terrifying bird flu strain ripping through Aussie wildlife
A terrifying bird flu strain is spreading through Australian wildlife, raising alarm among experts over the growing impact on native animals.
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The deadly bird flu strain killing wild birds across the country has now been found in all six states, as Tasmania records its first case.
The carcass of the wild bird was found in Tasmania’s northwest and state authorities revealed on Thursday the brown skua had been infected with the deadly strain of bird flu.
“Although we’ve had a positive detection, I want to be clear that there is no evidence of an outbreak and there is no detection in commercial poultry at this time,” Primary Industries Minister Gavin Pearce said.
The first confirmed case was in a brown skua found on Western Australia’s’s southern coast, and now only the ACT and the Northern Territory have not recorded an infection.
Skuas are large predatory seabirds that breed on Antarctic and sub-Antarctic islands and are native to Tasmania.
Mr Pearce said Tasmania had already been prepared to respond to the detection of H5N1 bird flu.
Department of Natural Resources and Environment secretary Jason Jacobi said it was inevitable the virus was found in Tasmania after other infected brown skuas were found elsewhere.
The department said it was not yet known where the bird acquired the virus, but that would be clear once testing was done at the CSIRO’s Australian Centre for Disease Preparedness.
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“When this sample comes back from its analysis at the ACDP in Geelong, that’s when they’ll have really detailed sequencing information,” threatened species scientist Rachael Alderman said.
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