Portugal on Alert as Europe Sees 1,900 Bird-Flu Outbreaks

Portugal’s poultry farmers are facing a familiar yet still unsettling foe: gripe aviária. Over the last 12 months nearly 1.900 outbreaks have swept through Europe, and although the country registered just 27 confirmed clusters, five of them erupted in the past few weeks—an uncomfortable reminder that the virus rarely respects borders, migratory or political. Health authorities insist the overall risk to the public remains low, but the economic and ecological stakes are anything but.

Why this surge resonates on the Iberian Peninsula

Portuguese producers recall how the 2021-22 epizootic cost export contracts and forced thousands of birds off the market. Today’s wave is numerically larger across the continent yet still comparatively tame here, thanks in part to the country’s dispersed backyard flocks rather than mega-farms. Even so, the Tagus estuary sits directly beneath a major migratory flyway; infected white-fronted geese and mute swans spotted in Germany and the Netherlands can reach the wetlands of Alcochete in a single journey. A handful of asymptomatic birds carrying the highly pathogenic H5N1 subtype is all it takes to seed fresh infection in a domestic coop.

A continental map of concern

Europe recorded 1.876 outbreaks between 1 October 2024 and 19 September 2025. Roughly 62 % involved wild species, reinforcing scientists’ view that the virus has become endemic among waterfowl. Hungary tops the table with 343 events, followed by Germany, the Netherlands, Poland and Italy. Portugal’s 27 incidents look modest in that context, yet epidemiologists warn that the rate of detection—five new sites in a single month—bears watching because it mirrors last season’s acceleration curve elsewhere. Notably, the rarer H5N5 lineage is cropping up in aquatic birds along the Atlantic coast, an ecological niche that overlaps with Portuguese lagoons.

Defensive playbook inside Portugal

The Direção-Geral de Alimentação e Veterinária moved swiftly once the first 2025 case appeared in São João das Lampas. Inspectors ordered the culling of 55.427 layers, imposed three-kilometre protection rings and ten-kilometre surveillance belts, and demanded the confinement of all free-range stock. Farm gates now display disinfectant footbaths, and lorries must keep digital logs of every kilometre travelled inside restricted zones. The agency’s “Campanha GAAP 2024/2025” also leans on community reporting: every backyard owner is urged to call a veterinarian at the first hint of sudden mortality.

Counting the economic and public-health chips

No official ledger tallies the nationwide cull or the lost revenue it generated, but producers privately admit that the January shutdown of a single Lisbon-area facility triggered supply-chain ripples as far as the Algarve. Internationally, Hong Kong and Macau slapped a temporary ban on Portuguese poultry, illustrating how trade embargoes can out-scale the disease itself. On the human-health front, European agencies classify the threat to the general population as “low”, yet laboratory sequencing has flagged 34 mutations that could, in theory, boost transmission among mammals. The presence of the virus in cats, foxes and even dairy cows abroad underscores the pathogen’s wanderlust.

What scientists still don’t know

Researchers at the ECDC and EFSA are watching whether the B3.13 genotype now rampant in US cattle can hitch a ride across the Atlantic, likely via migrating ducks. They are also dissecting why the summer lull—long a seasonal break—no longer exists; colonies of seabirds on Heligoland remained positive through August. For Portugal, that means the traditional comfort window between spring fairs and autumn shoots is shrinking. More than ever, routine testing of egrets in the Ria Formosa or cormorants on the Minho may provide the crucial early warnings that save both livelihoods and, potentially, lives.