Bird flu protection zone lifted in parts of Dorset
Captive birds and poultry can be kept outside again in parts of Dorset after the government lifted bird flu restrictions.
A 3km (two-mile) "captive bird (monitoring) controlled zone" was imposed on 18 May after bird flu was found at premises near Pokesdown.
The zone meant birds had to be kept housed and the sale of poultry eggs had to be monitored.
The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) said disease control measures in the area had been successfully completed.
Bird flu is a disease caused by a virus that infects birds and sometimes other animals.
The major strain - H5N1, which was the strain found in Pokesdown - has affected dairy cow herds in the United States.
Since 2021, there has been handful of recorded cases in humans.
In May, two peregrine falcons that were nesting at Christchurch Priory, about 3km from Pokesdown, died within days of each other.
Avian flu was later confirmed in one of the birds while the other was still being tested.
Anyone who finds a dead wild bird is asked to report it to DEFRA.
You can follow BBC Dorset on Facebook, X (Twitter), or Instagram.
Bird flu protection zone in place for parts of Dorset
Bird flu found in dead nesting peregrine falcon
Avian flu spread sees 1.8 million farmed birds culled
Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs
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Yahoo
a day 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. 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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.
3 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.'
San Francisco Chronicle
3 days ago
- San Francisco Chronicle
Long Island's last duck farm is quacking again after losing its entire flock to the bird flu
AQUEBOGUE, N.Y. (AP) — 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.' Make way for ducklings 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.' Bird flu pandemic still looms 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.' Carrying on local heritage 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.'
