DES MOINES, Iowa — More than 4 million chickens in Iowa will be euthanized after state agriculture officials announced Tuesday that a highly contagious case of bird flu was identified at a major Iowa egg farm.
Prior to that, the virus was confirmed at an egg farm near West Minneapolis, Minnesota, which lead to the cull of nearly 1.4 million chickens. From there, public health officials felt the virus made its way this Iowa egg farm.
A total of 92.34 million birds had been killed since the outbreak started in 2022, as reported by the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
With poultry, bird flu became commonplace. However, when it spread to cattle, it rattled public health officials. As it stood, a second dairy farmworker tested positive for bird flu and the virus was identified in beef and milk that person handled. That being said, bird flu was confirmed in dairy cattle across nine states.
Workers exposed to infected animals were at greater risk of contracting the disease. There were only three human cases confirmed in the United States in two dairy workers which effected one man that was slaughtering infected birds on a poultry farm.
Over the past months, public health officials warned of their concern regarding human exposure to the virus from poultry and cattle operations which could potentially cause the virus to mutate and impact humans more meaningfully.
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REFERENCES:
https://www.kare11.com/article/news/local/farmers-must-kill-42-million-chickens-iowa-egg-farm-bird-flu/89-0c2e6361-2169-467f-8cdd-2a920cc7c3d8
