What happens now bird flu has reached the Antarctic?

Science Weekly

The Guardian

Science

4.2 • 1K Ratings

🗓️ 6 February 2024

⏱️ 15 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

The moment scientists had been dreading arrived late last year, when H5N1, or bird flu, was found for the first time in the Antarctic. Last week a king penguin on the island of South Georgia became the first in the region to be suspected to have died from the disease. The Guardian’s biodiversity reporter, Phoebe Weston, tells Ian Sample why researchers have said the spread of bird flu through the Antarctic’s penguin colonies could signal ‘one of the largest ecological disasters of modern times’. Help support our independent journalism at theguardian.com/sciencepod

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	This is the Guardian.
0:09.0	Whether you're starting or scaling your company's security program, demonstrating top-notch security practices
0:16.0	and establishing trust is more important than ever.
0:19.5	Vanta automates compliance for SOC2, ISO 27001 and more, saving you time and money while helping you build
0:28.3	customer trust. Plus you can streamline security reviews by automating questionnaires and
0:34.7	demonstrating your security posture with a customer facing trust center
0:38.9	all powered by Vanta AI.
0:41.3	Over 7,000 global companies like Atlassian, Flow Health and Quora use
0:47.5	Vanta to manage risk and prove security in real time. Get $1,000 off Vanta when you go to Vanta.com slash go.
0:57.0	That's Vanta.com slash G.O for $1,000 off.
1:06.2	It's the news scientists were waiting for,
1:08.9	but hoped would never come.
1:11.2	As we saw it raced down South America, it was on everyone's radar. The fact is what is going to happen
1:17.3	when it gets in the Antarctic region. And this was the region that people were really, really concerned about it reaching and it's there now.
1:27.0	Bird flu has finally made its way across the globe to one of the planet's most inhospitable and vulnerable regions,
1:34.0	and it could spell disaster for some of our iconic species.
1:38.0	Particularly when we think about Antarctica,
1:40.0	it's probably the penguin populations.
1:43.0	They're very social creatures and they're all in these massive groups.
1:47.0	And it's so deadly and so contagious.
1:51.0	It's just going to rip through these really fragile isolated
1:55.2	populations. The level of mortalities could be pretty horrific.
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from The Guardian, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of The Guardian and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.