Coronaviruses in Avian Species – Review with Focus on Epidemiology and Diagnosis in Wild Birds

Milek, Justyna; Blicharz-Domanska, Katarzyna

Wild bird species serve as a natural reservoir of many emerging zoonotic pathogens and thus have a significant impact on public health. They are also the source of pathogens dangerous to domestic animals, and such infections could have socio-economic consequences. This is the reason why over the years wild birds have been under epidemiological surveillance. Among the viruses transmitted by wild birds, the most well-known are influenza A viruses (9) . Wild birds are also implicated in the spread of the West Nile virus, Borrelia burgdorferi, and other bacterial infections such as Salmonella or Campylobacter, and with them also resistance genes to antibiotics (35) . Studies from the last 10 years have also shown the presence of CoVs in wild birds (22, 24, 25, 53) . Among factors which make birds an excellent reservoir of various pathogens and also a bioreactor contributing to their variability, there are the high biodiversity of bird species, their ecological traits such gathering/grouping during feeding and roosting, but most importantly their capability to fly long distances (8) .