Tracking diseases like Covid-19 that leap from animals into humans

In this discussion recorded in 2017 on a farm in Dong Thap in the Mekong Delta and Ho Chi Minh City’s Factory Contemporary Arts Centre we hear how Vietnam’s agricultural economy makes it easy for diseases to spread to humans.

Claudia Hammond and Ha Mi hear from the farmers affected by the 2004 outbreak of the H5N1 strain of bird flu. Things have improved but only a third of those involved in slaughtering animals have any protective equipment – so many are at risk of breathing in virus particles and becoming infected.

Scientists test animals looking out for any new diseases which could spread to humans in the way that Ebola, Zika and HIV have – a process called zoonosis. But rice-field rats eaten by 90% of the locals do not pose a serious threat to human health.

At the gallery we hear about paintings of abattoirs, painted with cows’ blood – highlighting Vietnam’s changing relationship with food and death.

We hear about the Wellcome Trust’s Major Overseas Programme at the Oxford University Clinical Research Unit – including the story of a diseased duck that died, was buried and dug up by the farmer’s daughter, exposing her to H5N1 bird flu which killed her and her father.

Presenter: Claudia Hammond
Producer: Paula McGrath

(Image: Ducks in a row in Vietnam. Photo credit: AntGutz/Getty Images.)