Highly pathogenic bird flu has made its first appearance in U.S. commercial poultry flocks this season, affecting a turkey farm in South Dakota and one in Utah — raising concerns that more outbreaks could follow.
The flare-ups, affecting 47,300 turkeys in South Dakota on Oct. 4 and at a farm with 141,800 birds in Utah on Oct. 6, are the first reported among commercial operations in the U.S. since April. Indiana hasn’t had any cases of bird flu since May, when a noncommercial flock of 23 birds was discovered in Posey County.
Yet Indiana has lost 228,000 birds to avian flu since an outbreak was discovered at a Dubois County turkey farm on Feb. 9, 2022. Those Hoosier losses might’ve been higher were it not for the Indiana Board of Animal Health’s premises registration program, one of just two of its kind in the U.S.
During a meeting of the national Bipartisan Commission on Biodefense at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway last month, Dr. Bret Marsh, state veterinarian for the Indiana Board of Animal Health, asked commission members to consider a nationwide premises registration system after the 2022 bird flu outbreak killed 59 million table fowl in the U.S. – the nation’s deadliest outbreak ever, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
Indiana requires premises registration of all sites associated with the sale, purchase and exhibition of cattle, swine, sheep, goats, elk and deer. Horse and poultry sites may be registered on a voluntary basis, but many of those producers participate, said Denise Derrer Spears, the public information and media relations officer with the Board of Animal Health.
“The commercial guys, they (register) because they see the value in it,” Derrer Spears told The Journal Gazette Tuesday. “If someone has a backyard flock and they raise poultry, they’re not required to register, but we encourage it. That way, we can know to contact them if there is some kind of threat in their area.”
Bird flu infections in humans are rare. But last week, Cambodia reported its third human death from bird flu this year. As avian influenza hits other species, scientists fear it could mutate to spread more easily among people.
Infected fowl die from the virus, so euthanization of a flock where bird flu is found is carried out quickly to prevent spread. The farm must be decontaminated before the flock can be replaced.
The economic consequences of an avian flu outbreak at a Hoosier poultry farm adversely impact more than one farm family’s pocketbook. After the USDA confirmed a case of bird flu at the Dubois County turkey farm in February 2022, Taiwan placed a restriction on Hoosier poultry meat and egg products, and South Korea and China blocked poultry from Indiana.
After learning of the Dubois County outbreak, the state quarantined 17 other farms within a 10-kilometer radius of the infected site. Hundreds of thousands of turkeys were euthanized before the quarantine was lifted.
Those notifications to nearby farms would not have been possible without the Board of Animal Health’s premises registration program.
“It has proven time and again to be very valuable, and the producers in our state and the commodity organizations have gotten behind us and supported this wholeheartedly,” Derrer Spears said of the premises registration. “When we’ve had an event, we can get in our database system and very quickly make a determination, draw a circle around that and then figure out how many farms are in the area and who’s at risk so we can notify them.”
In the early 2000s, the USDA began encouraging states to start premises registration. Wisconsin launched the first state program and Indiana followed in 2006. Further adoptions of a registration system stalled due to widespread opposition from both producers and commodity organizations, Derrer Spears said.
State Veterinarian Marsh is right to push the Bipartisan Commission on Biodefense to adopt a national premises registration program for U.S. livestock. But first the state Board of Animal Health should mandate commercial poultry producers’ participation in the registration system.
Indiana is first in the nation in duck production, second in egg production and third in pounds of turkeys produced. When something goes afoul with Hoosier table fowl production, it makes national headlines and can lead to export bans and imperil poultry operations throughout Indiana and in nearby states.
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