Bird flu reaches suburban streets in troubling new shift

Your backyard could be the next battleground in Australia’s bird flu crisis, with more than 500 wildlife cases now recorded nationwide and infected foxes detected in suburbia for the first time. South Australia has emerged as the nation’s hotspot with 281 confirmed cases as of September 8, many of them across inner and outer metropolitan suburbs, as experts warn household bins, pet food and backyard animals may be helping draw pests into residential streets. Nationally, that number sits at 502 confirmed positive H5 bird flu events in wildlife, 155 in Victoria, 32 in Tasmania, 10 each in New South Wales and Western Australia, and two in Queensland. MORE NEWS $200 rent rise forces student into his car Housemate kept stealing food – then cat blew her cover ‘AI is taking over’: Fears for teen jobs at Hungry Jack’s The alarming numbers have triggered calls for a major rethink on how Australians manage their properties, with pressure growing on homeowners to lock down food sources, protect pets and stop treating bird flu as a problem confined to farms and wetlands. The warning follows the detection of H5 bird flu in a red fox in metropolitan Adelaide in late August, the first time the vi...