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Following extensive losses among mink farms in the EU, it was inevitable that farmers in the U.S. would encounter the disease.

Utah has experienced COVID-19 in mink operations that have been quarantined.  The disease has now appeared in mink farms in Wisconsin with high mortality, parallelingthe situation in Holland, Denmark, and Spain.  That mink are susceptible to COVID-19 should be expected given that ferrets, a closely related species, are used as experimental animals.

Epidemiological investigations in the EU demonstrated that SARS-CoV-2 was transmissible from humans to mink and vice versa and accordingly mink on affected farms were depleted.  The issue of suppressing mink farming as a public health and welfare issue has caused deep division in Poland where there is support for a ban as in the Netherlands.

State and Federal officials have yet to address the issue of COVID-19 in mink and have not provided details as to the disease status of specific farms or the status of owners and caretakers with regard to infection.  Simply quarantining farms will probably not be effective given that asymptomatic humans may introduce or disseminate infection.

The decision to depopulate affected mink farms in Holland was based on the concern that a more virulent strain of SARS-CoV-2 might emerge through mutation in a dense population of confined animals in close contact with humans.