Salt Lake Tribune: Bird flu death in Washington state renews concern as virus spreads unchecked at Utah mink farm
https://www.sltrib.com/news/2026/11/06/bird-flu-death-washington-state/
0 Boosts
0 Likes
@Affekt @ai6yr I came across a store recently that was selling them. I was intensely curious as my hobby is historical costuming, and had never seen a modern real fur coat in person. Construction, hand, weight etc.
I expected expensive but was shocked.
$40k a pop, for the high end furs like mink.
Just another way that billionaires will kill us all.
@LynnD @sewblue @Affekt @ai6yr Someone locally here bought a building that previously housed a dry cleaning business for decades. There were dozens of fur coats in the basement vault. The owners were all deceased. The ones where they couldn’t track down a living descendant were donated to local community theater groups.
@ai6yr one day, when a third of humanity is wiped out by a flu hopefully the survivors will look back and say "at least they had fur coats".
Factory farming in general is a deplorable practice but mink farming is especially likely to be a source for bird flu to make it to humans. It must be for export because in 45 years I don't ever remember seeing a mink anything outside a movie prop.