A brown skua seabird found near New Zealand's capital Wellington has tested positive for H5N1, marking the country's first detection of the bird flu strain.
New Zealand's Biosecurity Minister Andrew Hoggard said there was no evidence of mass wildlife deaths, transmission between wild birds in New Zealand or any detection in poultry.
The case follows detections in neighbouring Australia, which reported H5N1 last month and had 14 confirmed or presumed positive H5 bird flu detections as of Wednesday.
The highly pathogenic H5 strain has spread through wild bird and mammal populations since 2021, killing millions and affecting poultry and dairy farms as well as some farmworkers.
New Zealand has been working with the poultry industry on biosecurity and resilience plans, while officials have begun vaccinating 300 core breeding birds from five of the country’s most endangered species.
Many of New Zealand's endemic birds are unusually vulnerable because they evolved for millions of years without native land mammals, leaving many unique species, which are flightless, ground-nesting and poorly equipped to defend themselves against predators.
Houthi attacks target Riyadh amid concerns over Saudi oil supplies, as Iran says it will not reopen the Strait of Hormuz until its conditions are m...
The death toll from an overnight Russian attack on the Kyiv region rose to four, including three children, Kyiv regional authorities said on Sunday...
Uzbekistan’s grape exports have grown rapidly. In January-August 2025, the country exported 86,200 tonnes of fresh grapes worth $78.3 million...
Iran's Revolutionary Guards Navy said a Togo-flagged oil tanker was struck while attempting to make an “illegal passage” through the Strait of Hormuz, Iranian state media said early on Friday.
Saudi civil defence sent an all-clear on Saturday after issuing alerts for a second time for potential danger in Riyadh and the city of Al-Kharj east of the capital, amid an uptick in attacks by Iran-aligned Houthis on the Gulf country.
The European Union will disburse €3.3 billion ($3.8 billion) to Ukraine for missiles and drones, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said after a phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
The U.S. State Department approved a $2.7 billion military sale to Ukraine for air-defence development upgrades, along with related equipment and services, the department said. Meanwhile, Ukrainian authorities reported at least 10 people had died in Russian attacks over the last 24 hours.
Three students were killed in a school shooting in the southern Philippines on Friday, including a 16-year-old suspected gunman who turned the gun on himself, provincial officials said.
Chinese researchers have developed the world’s smallest CT scanner, a portable device designed to produce images of tiny fossils and archaeological relics.
Here's your AnewZ Daily Brief for 17 September 2026. These are the top five stories making headlines in the field of health.
Doctors in St. Louis have successfully separated Ethiopian two-year-old twin girls who were born joined at the head after a months-long series of complex operations culminating in a nearly 25-hour final procedure, doctors said on Wednesday.
Tobacco use may significantly reduce fertility in both men and women, according to a new World Health Organization (WHO) publication that highlights growing evidence linking smoking and exposure to second-hand smoke with reproductive health problems.
A record-breaking heatwave that swept across western Europe in late June has been linked to more than 10,000 excess deaths, according to newly released mortality data, highlighting the growing human toll of extreme temperatures across the continent.
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