US tackles bird flu: See outbreak's impact on animals, farm and vaccines

US tackles bird flu: See outbreak's impact on animals, farm and vaccines
Dawn O'Connell, Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, gets a look at the syringe filler during a tour of bird flu vaccine manufacturer CSL Seqirus in Holly Springs, N.C., in 2024. Alex Boerner, USA TODAY Network
Ravens and a gull feed on the carcass of a Canada goose on Oldham Pond in Pembroke, Mass., Jan. 29, 2025. Across the South Shore bird flu is killing waterfowl on ponds. Many of the dead birds are being eaten by raptors or scavengers. Greg Derr, The Patriot Ledger Via USA TODAY Network
A pod of dolphins feeds in the Haulover Canal in Titusville, Fla., Jan. 6, 2025. Scientists have confirmed the bird flu virus in three dead dolphins. Craig Bailey, Florida Today Via USA TODAY Network
Broox Daniel demonstrates how to swab the throat of a chicken to test for avian flu on her daughter's buff brahma chicken named Flash at their EB Daniel Farm in Olalla, Wash., Jan. 8, 2025. Meegan M. Reid, Kitsap Sun Via USA TODAY Network
Filled vaccines are inspected using a Brevetti inspection system at the CSL Seqirus vaccine manufacturing facility in Holly Springs, N.C., in 2024. Alex Boerner, USA TODAY Network
A demonstration of the shoe wash and disinfecting bath used before staffers enter the zoo's vet hospital holding area where some birds are settled. With bird flu hitting the U.S., the zoo has implemented many precautions to keep its animals and workers safe. Kris Craig, The Providence Journa Via USA TODAY Network
The remains of a Canada goose after it was eaten by a predator on Hobart Pond in Whitman, Mass. Across the South Shore bird flu is killing waterfowl on ponds. Many of the dead birds are being eaten by raptors or scavengers on Jan. 29, 2025. Greg Derr, The Patriot Ledger Via USA TODAY Network
Chatham Animal Control Officer Diane Byers picks up a dead sea duck on Scatteree Landing in Chatham, Mass., Feb. 5, 2025. Area officials were responding to concerns about the H5N1 avian flu that has caused death in birds. Merrily Cassidy, Cape Cod Times Via USA TODAY Network
A dead Red-breasted Merganser sits on the shore of 31st Street Beach after dead birds began washing ashore on Lake Michigan, prompting a warning from health authorities ahead of tests for bird flu, in Chicago, Ill., Feb. 5, 2025. Vincent Alban, Reuters
A sign for customers shopping for eggs at Trader Joe's hangs by cartons of eggs in Merrick, N.Y., Feb. 10, 2025. Shannon Stapleton, Reuters
HDC receiving staff prep arriving milk samples for testing at the Animal Health Diagnostic Center at Cornell University on Dec. 10, 2024 in Ithaca, N.Y. The U.S. Department of Agriculture last week issued a federal order that requires the testing of the nation's milk supply amid increasing concerns over HPAI (a strain of the H5N1 avian flu), which has been raising alarm since it was first detected in a Texas cow. In July 2024, New York lawmakers gave $19.5 million in order to expand the Animal Health Diagnostic Center at Cornell University, after avian flu was confirmed to be spreading to dairy cattle. The virus has spread to over 710 dairy herds across 15 states. Michael M. Santiago, Getty Images
Cows from a non-suspect herd are milked at the Cornell Teaching Dairy Barn at Cornell University on Dec. 11, 2024 in Ithaca, N.Y.. The U.S. Department of Agriculture last week issued a federal order that requires the testing of the nation's milk supply amid increasing concerns over H5N1 (avian flu), which has been raising alarm since it was first detected in a Texas cow. In July 2024, New York lawmakers gave $19.5 million in order to expand the Animal Health Diagnostic Center at Cornell University, after avian flu was confirmed to be spreading to dairy cattle. The virus has spread to over 710 dairy herds across 15 states. Michael M. Santiago, Getty Images
ITHACA, NEW YORK - DECEMBER 11: A sample of milk is taken from a cow from a non-suspect herd to be tested at the Cornell Teaching Dairy Barn at Cornell University on December 11, 2024 in Ithaca, New York. The U.S. Department of Agriculture last week issued a federal order that requires the testing of the nation's milk supply amid increasing concerns over H5N1 (avian flu), which has been raising alarm since it was first detected in a Texas cow. In July 2024, New York lawmakers gave $19.5 million in order to expand the Animal Health Diagnostic Center at Cornell University, after avian flu was confirmed to be spreading to dairy cattle. The virus has spread to over 710 dairy herds across 15 states. (Photo by Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images) Michael M. Santiago, Getty Images
Chickens are transported on a semi-truck trailer along Highway 99 near Fresno, Calif., on Feb. 12, 2025. A resurgence of avian flu, which first struck the United States in 2022, is hitting chicken farms hard, sending egg prices soaring and rattling consumers accustomed to buying this dietary staple for only a few dollars. Patrick T. Fallon, AFP Via Getty Images
Empty shelves of eggs are seen in a supermarket in the Manhattan borough of New York City on Feb. 20, 2025. The recent U.S. outbreak of bird flu since early 2024 is exacting a heavy toll on poultry farms. More than 21 million egg-laying hens have been "depopulated" this year so far, after 13.2 million were culled in December, according to the US Department of Agriculture. CHARLY TRIBALLEAU, AFP Via Getty Images
Chickens stand in a henhouse at Sunrise Farms on Feb. 18, 2025 in Petaluma, Calif. As egg prices continue to skyrocket due to the avian flu outbreak, egg farmers are having to invest millions of dollars in biosecurity efforts to keep their flocks safe. Fourth-generation egg farm Sunrise Farms in Petaluma lost 550,000 chickens to avian flu in December of 2023, marking the first time in 112 years that the main family farm had no chickens. It took Sunrise Farms over a year to rebuild their flock to 900,000 chickens that produce nearly 500,000 eggs a week. Justin Sullivan, Getty Images
Mike Weber, co-owner of Sunrise Farms, holds a chicken inside a henhouse at his farm on February 18, 2025 in Petaluma, Calif. As egg prices continue to skyrocket due to the avian flu outbreak, egg farmers are having to invest millions of dollars in biosecurity efforts to keep their flocks safe. Fourth-generation egg farm Sunrise Farms in Petaluma lost 550,000 chickens to avian flu in December of 2023, marking the first time in 112 years that the main family farm had no chickens. It took Sunrise Farms over a year to rebuild their flock to 900,000 chickens that produce nearly 500,000 eggs a week. Justin Sullivan, Getty Images
Defective eggs are discarded from an egg washer at Sunrise Farms on Feb. 18, 2025 in Petaluma, Calif. As egg prices continue to skyrocket due to the avian flu outbreak, egg farmers are having to invest millions of dollars in biosecurity efforts to keep their flocks safe. Fourth-generation egg farm Sunrise Farms in Petaluma, California lost 550,000 chickens to avian flu in December of 2023, marking the first time in 112 years that the main family farm had no chickens. It took Sunrise Farms over a year to rebuild their flock to 900,000 chickens that produce nearly 500,000 eggs a week. Justin Sullivan, Getty Images
Eggs are displayed for sale on the street in Chinatown on Feb. 25, 2025 in New York City. The wholesale price for a dozen eggs in U.S. cities hit $4.95 last month. That is more than 50% higher than this time last year and is beginning to affect household budgets. Spencer Platt, Getty Images

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Yahoo

4 hours ago

• Yahoo

Pandemic preparedness ‘dramatically eroding' under Trump, experts say

Amid controversial dismissals for independent advisers and staff at health agencies, alongside lackluster responses to the bird flu and measles outbreaks, experts fear the US is now in worse shape to respond to a pandemic than before 2020. H5N1, which has received less attention under the Trump administration than from Biden's team, is not the only influenza virus or even the only variant of bird flu with the potential to spark a pandemic. But a subpar response to the ongoing US outbreak signals a larger issue: America is not ready for whatever pathogen will sweep through next. 'We have not even remotely maintained the level of pandemic preparedness – which needed a lot of work, as we saw from the Covid pandemic,' said Angela Rasmussen, an American virologist at the Vaccine and Infectious Disease Organization at the University of Saskatchewan in Canada. 'But now, we essentially have no pandemic preparedness.' Related: Bird flu reinfections at US poultry farms highlight need for vaccines, experts say 'I'm concerned on a number of fronts,' said Jennifer Nuzzo, professor of epidemiology and director of the Pandemic Center at Brown University School of Public Health. Those concerns include a lack of quality information from officials, weakened virus monitoring systems, and public health reductions at the federal, state and local levels. 'The thing that I am most concerned about is the veracity of information coming out of the health agencies,' Nuzzo said. In the ongoing outbreaks of measles, for example, Robert F Kennedy Jr, the secretary of health and human services, has downplayed the severity of the disease, spread misinformation about the highly effective vaccine to prevent measles, and pushed unproven treatments. 'The communications on measles gives me deep worries about what would happen in a pandemic,' Nuzzo said. 'If a pandemic were to occur today, the only thing we would have to protect ourselves on day one would be information.' The H5N1 outbreak has been plagued by incomplete information, an issue that began in the Biden administration but has amplified under Trump. In Arizona, 6 million chickens were killed or culled at a Hickman's Family Farms location because of H5N1 in May. That's about 95% of the company's hen population in the state. Hundreds of workers, including inmate laborers, are now being dismissed as Arizona braces for egg shortages. We're not testing – it's not that there are no new cases Angela Rasmussen Yet even as H5N1 outbreaks continue to spread on farms and wreak havoc on the food supply, no new bird flu cases have been reported in people for months. 'I am concerned that we may not be finding new infections in humans,' Nuzzo said – and a lack of testing may be the culprit. 'We're not testing – it's not that there are no new cases,' Rassmussen said. The last bird flu case in a person was listed by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on 23 February. At that point, at least 830 people in the US had been tested after contact with sick animals. This kind of testing – monitoring the health of people who regularly work with H5N1-infected animals – is how the vast majority of cases (64 out of 70) have been found in this outbreak. But then, several CDC officials overseeing the bird flu response were fired on 1 April. Since then, only about 50 people in the US have been tested after exposure to sick animals – and no positive cases have been announced. It's also been difficult to understand the extent of the outbreak and how the virus spreads among animals. 'We still just don't have a good picture of the scope and scale of this outbreak – we never really have. And until we have that, we're not going to be able to contain it,' Rasmussen said. 'It's extremely bad,' she continued. 'We don't have any information about what's happening right now. The next pandemic could be starting, and we just don't know where that's happening, and we don't have any ability to find out.' We're seeing health departments scrambling. That infrastructure is just dramatically eroding Jennifer Nuzzo Huge reductions in the public health workforce and resources has led to less monitoring of outbreaks, known as disease surveillance. 'Cutting back on that surveillance is leaving us more in the dark,' Nuzzo said. The CDC clawed back $11.4bn in Covid funding in March. This funding was used to monitor, test, vaccinate and otherwise respond to public health issues at the state, local, territorial and tribal level. 'We're seeing health departments scrambling,' Nuzzo said. 'That infrastructure is just dramatically eroding.' International monitoring programs to address outbreaks before they expand across borders have also been cancelled. 'We have taken for granted all of those protections, and I fear that we are poised to see the consequences,' Nuzzo said. Trump's crackdown on immigration also poses a major challenge in detecting cases and treating patients during outbreaks. 'A lot of the people who are most at risk are strongly disincentivized to report any cases, given that many of them are undocumented or are not US citizens,' Rasmussen said. 'Nobody wants to go get tested if they're going to end up in an Ice detention facility.' When cases are not detected, that means patients are not able to access care. Although it's rare for people to become sick with H5N1, for instance – the virus is still primarily an avian, not a human, influenza – this variant of bird flu has a 52% mortality rate globally among people with known infections. Allowing a deadly virus to spread and mutate under the radar has troubling implications for its ability to change into a human influenza without anyone knowing. And if such changes were detected, widening gaps in communication could be the next hurdle for preventing a pandemic, Nuzzo said. 'Communication is our most important public health intervention. People, in order to be able to know how to protect themselves, need to have access to facts, and they need to believe in the messengers. And the communication around the measles outbreaks are deeply eroding our standing with the American people.' Even stockpiled vaccines and other protective measures, like personal protective equipment, take time to distribute, Nuzzo added. 'And flu is a fast-moving disease that could cause a lot of damage in the months it would take to mount a vaccination campaign.' The US government's cancellation of its $766m contract with Moderna to research and develop an H5N1 vaccine also signals a concerning strategy from health officials, Nuzzo and Rasmussen said. Other restrictions on vaccine development, like a new plan to test all vaccines against saline placebos, is 'going to make it extremely difficult to approve any new vaccine' and would 'have a devastating impact on our ability to respond to a potential pandemic', Rasmussen said – especially in a rapidly moving pandemic where speed matters. 'You don't have time for that if this virus causes a human-to–human outbreak,' Rasmussen said. All of these policies mean the US is less prepared for a pandemic than it was in 2020, she said. And it also means there will be preventable suffering now, even before the next big one strikes. 'We are actively making people less safe, less healthy and more dead,' Rasmussen said.

Forbes

a day ago

• Forbes

Should We Be Worried About Bird Flu? Public Health Experts Say Yes

Battery hens sit in a chicken shed in Suffolk, England. (Photo by) You don't need me to tell you Covid-19 changed the world. While the pandemic did help expose structural inequalities and disparities, especially in the food system, the loss of life and livelihood has been one of the greatest tragedies of our lifetimes. I'm bringing this up because, if we ignore the lessons we should've learned from this pandemic, future disease outbreaks will be much, much worse. And I'm deeply concerned that, when it comes to avian flu—a.k.a. Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza A (HPAI) H5N1—we're on a dangerously wrong path. This virus typically affects birds, including poultry, and there's a current outbreak that has affected close to 150 million birds and devastated farms since 2022. Also concerningly, scientists have detected the virus in mammals in recent years—including dairy cows and humans—and learned it can spread between mammals, which significantly raises the outbreak risk. And since 2024, 102 cases of avian flu and 10 deaths have been reported in humans globally, a potentially staggering fatality rate. Many of these global cases over the past year and a half—about 70—have been in the U.S., which means the world's eyes are watching. And so far, this country's response has been nearly the polar opposite of what scientists call for, which puts everyone around the world in greater danger. 'We have so many tools, but they're not being used optimally—and they're not being used optimally by choice,' says Dr. Amesh Adalja, a Senior Scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security and an expert in global public health. 'We can change the trajectory of this if we actually take those best practices, take those tools, and use them optimally.' To be perfectly clear, there is currently no known person-to-person spread of avian flu and experts say the current public health risk is low, per the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. What this means, though, is that the time to prevent and contain this virus is right now. There's a very real possibility that avian flu could pose a greater threat in the future, and we can't be caught unprepared. The correct course of action involves vaccination, investments in public health, and global collaboration—all of which appear to be under threat given recent U.S. policy developments. Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins' original plan to combat avian flu included US$100 million in research and vaccine development. But shortly after announcing it, she reversed course and told right-wing site Breitbart that vaccines were 'off the table.' Meanwhile, in May, the Trump-Vance Administration cancelled a massive contract with Moderna to develop a vaccination for humans against bird flu, and this month, Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. fired all 17 members of the advisory committee that helps develop vaccine policy and recommendations for the CDC. 'I'm optimistic that they will continue to support the development of these vaccines. It would be a crime right now to stop it,' said Scott Hensley, a virologist at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia who worked on an avian flu vaccine for cattle. Vaccines save lives. Just last month, early results from that experimental bird flu vaccine for cattle came back promising. The U.S. Department of Agriculture conditionally approved a vaccine for poultry this spring, and some countries, like China and France, already vaccinate poultry against H5N1. Even in humans, Finland last year became the first country to roll out bird flu vaccines among its population. Alternative courses of action, rather than vaccines, are devastating: In March, Kennedy suggested farmers 'should consider maybe the possibility of letting it run through the flock so that we can identify the birds and preserve the birds that are immune to it.' This, as former Kansas state veterinarian Dr. Gail Hansen put it, is a 'terrible idea' and a 'recipe for disaster.' Dr. Adalja did not mince words. If the past year has been a trial run for how the government might respond to the actual emergence of an avian flu pandemic, he says, 'we've failed this trial run.' Optimistically, on a global level, the World Health Organization (WHO) has been taking positive steps toward international collaboration: WHO's Global Influenza Surveillance and Response System closely monitors avian and other animal influenza viruses, and in May, member states approved an agreement to better prevent, prepare for, and respond to outbreaks and learn from mistakes made at the height of the Covid pandemic. But remember, the Trump-Vance Administration pulled the U.S. out of the WHO effective in 2026, and has revoked a variety of investments in global and domestic health programs. These decisions are not abstract, Dr. Adalja says: they 'make these types of events much harder to prepare for and much harder to control.' As Covid-19 made abundantly clear, viruses don't stop at national borders. Keeping the public healthy and preparing for pandemic risks simply must be more important than politicking. And when we're heading in the wrong direction, there is a moral obligation to sound the alarm—and to illuminate a better path forward.

2 days ago

Long Island's last duck farm is quacking again after losing its entire flock to the bird flu

AQUEBOGUE, N.Y. -- Doug Corwin knew there was a problem at his family's commercial duck farm in Long Island when he spotted scores of dead or lethargic birds during a barn inspection in January. Within days, Crescent Duck Farm became a casualty of the global avian flu outbreak, one of many farms around the U.S. that had to cull their entire flock, sending the prices of eggs and other agricultural commodities soaring. Now the more than century-old farm — the last duck farm remaining in a New York region once synonymous with the culinary delicacy — is cautiously rebuilding. But for Corwin, a 66-year-old fourth-generation farmer, it's not enough to bring the farm back to its 100,000-bird capacity. With ducks hatched from eggs spared from slaughter, he's working to preserve the unique lineage of fowl that's allowed his family's farm to thrive even as others on Long Island fell by the wayside — all while worrying that another flu outbreak would finally wipe him out. 'All I know is I don't want to be hit again,' Corwin said. 'If I go through this twice, I'm done as a duck farmer.' For months, Corwin and his reduced staff have been thoroughly sanitizing the farm's dozens of barns, clearing out hay and debris, and replacing feeders, ventilation systems, wooden and metal structures and more. At the end of May, the first wave of roughly 900 young ducks arrived from a nearby farm where they had been carefully raised in quarantine these last few months. Another batch of 900 arrived last week and some 900 more will soon make their way to the roughly 140-acre (55-hectare) farm in Aquebogue, which is tucked among the vineyards and agricultural lands of Long Island's North Fork, about 80 miles (129 km) east of Manhattan. By the end of next summer, Corwin hopes the first ducks will be ready to be processed and brought to market. But he says he won't rush the reopening. It will be many more months — if ever — before the operation, which processed about 1 million ducks for consumption annually, returns to full capacity, he said. 'I keep telling people I'm running a high hurdle race,' Corwin said. 'I've got a lot a lot of steps to get back to where we were.' Since 2022, the H5N1 strain of bird flu has been detected in all 50 states, leading to more than 1,700 recorded outbreaks affecting nearly 175 million birds, according to the most recent tally from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The outbreak at Corwin's farm shows how this strain has inflicted more damage on a wider range of species than past variants, said Dr. Gavin Hitchener, director of Cornell University's Duck Research Laboratory, located a short drive away in Eastport. Ducks have generally been less prone to serious illness and death than chickens and turkeys, he said. H5N1 is also vexing American cattle farmers after the virus jumped from fowl to cattle last year. 'Something has changed in the virus' makeup that has made it more virulent,' Hitchener said. With no end to the bird flu pandemic in sight, Corwin worries he won't be able to weather another outbreak. The farm received federal compensation for its euthanized ducks, but it wasn't nearly close to the market value of the birds — never mind the expense of rebuilding in a high cost region that also includes the Hamptons, he said. Corwin hopes the federal government will, at long last, require poultry operators to vaccinate their livestock against bird flu. It's an uphill climb, given the Trump administration's deep skepticism of vaccines and the long-standing opposition of far larger, industrial poultry operations, he acknowledged. 'I would sleep an awful lot better at night. But right now I'm very nervous,' Corwin said. 'We're just playing with deck chairs on the Titanic.' The ducks newly arrived to the farm are crucial to its revival. Fully grown and approaching breeding age, the cohort of white Pekin ducks were all that survived from the more than 15,000 eggs state officials allowed the farm to spare from the winter culling after they tested negative for bird flu. That means they and their progeny carry on the unique genetic makeup the farm has honed over generations of selective breeding to build its reputation. Established in 1908 by Corwin's great-grandfather, Crescent Duck Farms has been the island's lone commercial duck operation for the better part of a decade. But in the early 1960s, Long Island boasted more than 100 farms producing about two-thirds of the nation's duck output. 'I feel I owe it to the ancestors of farmers who've been here all these years and have come this far to just make a go of it,' Corwin said. 'I want to make Long Island proud.'