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A bird flu virus that’s a different strain than the one that ravaged turkey and chicken farms in the Midwest last summer has been found at a southern in turkey farm, federal officials said Friday, cautioning that a quick response could stem any larger outbreak. Public Information Director Denise Derrer says the state is trying to push the message that there are no food safety issues with products from Indiana’s significant poultry industry.
Mittal says it’s important that farmers be proactive in testing their birds, as it could help stop the spread from farm to farm.
More than 48 million chickens and turkeys either died from the bird flu in 2015 or were killed in their barns to contain the spread of the disease.
All of the turkey farms where the virus has been found are in Dubois County, a county about 70 miles west of Louisville, Kentucky, that is Indiana’s top poultry producer. The CDC said people at greatest risk are those who have close or prolonged unprotected contact with infected birds or their environments.
It has been less than three months since the last of the commercial poultry operations struck by bird flu in Iowa was given the all-clear.
That means that as farmers try to stamp out the virus before it becomes more virulent or infects more of their flock, additional birds may be culled as the year goes on.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention considers the risk of illness to humans from bird flu to be very low.
The first infection was confirmed last week at a 60,000-turkey farm with connections to major Indiana-based producer Farbest Farms, which has contract growers in Indiana, Illinois and Kentucky. While their turkeys tested negative for the H7N8 virus, Denu says the outbreak has taken a toll.
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