Professor Karina Butler:

Many of our challenges as we go forward will be related to zoonosis. A big one all members are familiar with is flu. That is what we worry about. We worry about birds, avian flu and mutations occurring that facilitate the spread in humans. There are many other areas also. This is ultimately a zoonosis. We do not have any real evidence that there is a lot of animal to human transmission in this. We do not say that could never happen. One of the ways to protect against it is by everyone getting vaccinated.

On the culling of the mink, the information is limited. There was concern that the disease might pass back into humans from the mink but there was not definitive evidence of that. It is an area on which we have to keep a watching brief.

Human pets have not proven to be a huge problem that we know of. Occasionally, cats and dogs have had the virus but they have not seemed to have it to a great degree or to pass it on very much. We are watching that space.