The bird flu doom loop

Plus: Climate-proofing coffee, all those Veep comparisons, and more July 24, 2024 [View in browser]( Good morning! Today, senior reporter Kenny Torrella is here to talk about another issue confronting America — the bird flu crisis — and some really grim milestones it recently reached. —Caroline Houck, senior editor of news   [chicken seen behind bars] Moment/Getty Images We might need to learn to live with bird flu For more than two years, the US poultry industry has been battling a highly virulent strain of avian influenza, or bird flu. The virus has driven up egg and turkey prices and crossed over from infecting just birds to numerous mammalian species, including sea lions, mice, cats, dairy cows, and, increasingly, humans. And it shows no signs of stopping — only reaching new milestones. The first milestone reached this month concerns the birds themselves. Last week, a Weld County, Colorado, farm that housed 1.3 million egg-laying hens detected bird flu and, per [federal policy](, was forced to kill the whole flock in an effort to slow the spread of the virus. Those 1.3 million dead birds tipped the total number of chickens and turkeys killed during this outbreak to over 100 million — double the total from the [previous outbreak]( in 2014 and 2015. The second milestone concerns us humans. Earlier in July, bird flu was detected on an even bigger farm — housing 1.78 million hens — in the same Colorado county as the first farm. A crew of some [150 workers]( was deployed to kill the hens. They were given goggles and masks for protection, but the 104-degree heat combined with strong industrial fans in the barns made it [difficult]( for the gear to work effectively. [Six]( workers contracted the virus, which made it the single most infectious bird flu event for humans in US history, more than doubling the number of Americans who had contracted the virus since April 2022. [Around half]( of the nearly 900 people who’ve fallen ill to H5N1 globally since the early 2000s have died, though the variant circulating during this outbreak has proven quite mild in humans. Patients in Colorado and elsewhere have reported pink eye, fever, and coughing. The Centers for Disease Control maintains that the risk to the American public [remains low](. I spoke with four bird flu experts who generally agree with that risk assessment, but with some important caveats, which brings us to the third milestone. Some of those experts said that, based on [genetic sequencing]( from one of the sickened farmworkers, the strain of the virus that infected all those hens and workers is [related]( to a strain that’s been circulating in cows. That means the strain is more infectious for other mammals — like humans — than a normal poultry H5N1 virus. “I don't think it is a coincidence that several people were infected with this version of the virus, which has adapted to cows,” said [Philip Meade](, a microbiologist at Mount Sinai Health System. [An empty duck farm in the background held thousands of birds who were killed with carbon dioxide gas (CO2) after the highly pathogenic H5N1 virus was detected at the site.] Jo-Anne McArthur / We Animals Media This doesn’t mean a bird flu pandemic is on the horizon. For that to happen, the virus would have to evolve in such a way that it effectively transmits from human to human and causes more severe symptoms, which may never happen. But that’s the bedeviling nature of bird flu — it’s [highly unpredictable](. Tom Peacock, a virologist fellow at the Pirbright Institute, which researches livestock diseases, said the risk level remains low “until it suddenly isn’t,” in the event that the virus adapts to transmit between people. That it’s circulating among cows increases the possibility that it could occur. Is bird flu here to stay? That the virus has been spreading in the US for over two years also raises the question as to whether it’s endemic, meaning it circulates year-round. Experts told me it’s highly likely that it’s already endemic in wild birds, the original reservoir for the virus, which spread it to poultry farms in the spring and fall during migration. In [Europe](, which has experienced a steep decline in bird flu outbreaks on poultry farms this year, wild birds seem to have gained some immunity from the virus, which could happen here too. But the persistence of H5N1 in the US during the summer months suggests that a “decent proportion” of recent poultry outbreaks, according to Peacock, seem to be caused by the cattle strain, which he described as a major change. “The concern here is that the virus can maintain a transmission cycle involving cattle — which don't usually die or sometimes even develop noticeable symptoms from bird flu — creating a reservoir from which the virus could mutate unfavorably or cause human outbreaks,” said [Brady Page](, an infectious disease research fellow at the Scripps Research Institute. In short, we could be entering some kind of bird flu doom loop, in which it has multiple reservoirs to infect farmed birds, and can more readily adapt to infect mammals. [A drenched young turkey sits still alive in a sea of thick firefighting foam covering a barn floor. Following the detection of avian influenza in the turkey flock at this Israeli kibbutz, authorities used compressed firefighting foam to mass-suffocate the birds, claiming it to be the most efficient and humane method of extermination.] Glass Walls / We Animals Media That the threat level is on the rise is also a damning indictment of the US Department of Agriculture’s [sclerotic response]( to the virus, which has drawn [sharp criticism]( from the infectious disease research community. Bird flu first began to infect dairy cows late last year, but it wasn’t detected until late March. The USDA then took several weeks to upload critical data about the virus. It also didn’t mandate routine testing of dairy cows, and farms with positive H5N1 tests weren’t required to report them — a move that hamstrung [scientists’ efforts to track and prevent the spread](. It took a month for the agency to at least require testing before cows crossed state lines, and there’s no proactive effort to test large numbers of farm workers. The response is in line with the USDA’s deferential relationship to industry and explains in part how we got here. The USDA has resisted calls to [vaccinate poultry birds]( because it would disrupt trade agreements, and thus the industry’s bottom line. The USDA also helped build the modern factory farming system, which provides the [perfect conditions]( for viruses to spread: hundreds to thousands of weak, genetically identical animals packed together in unsanitary barns. “We should treat potential pandemic threats like this virus with the same seriousness that we apply to our national defense,” said Meade, the Mount Sinai researcher. If we don’t, we’ll have a harder time breaking out of the bird flu doom loop. Without a vigorous response to contain the virus — and sober reflections on the [pandemic risk]( posed by America’s meat industry — we’re likely to see more and more farmed birds [dying horrible deaths](, more sickened cows, higher food prices, and an increased threat that we spark the next pandemic. —[Kenny Torrella, senior reporter](   [Listen]( Dengue’s biggest year ever More than 10 million people worldwide have contracted dengue from mosquitos this year. Now experts are worried it might show up at the Olympics. [Listen now](   ONLINE - Can Kamala Harris meme her way to becoming president?: Her “Brat” summer, explained in the context of all in which you live. [[Vox](] - Videos of Olympic hauls: And we don’t mean medals. [[NYT](] [Veep cast sits at a panel below a banner showing the show name]( Deadline/Penske Media via Getty Images CULTURE - Perms are back: And this time, teen boys are getting in on the action. 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