January 26, 2015
The first case of the highly pathogenic H5N8 avian flu has been detected at a commercial U.S. poultry operation. Foster Farms, a California-based commercial turkey farm has been quarantined after the confirmation of a detected case of avian flu in its flock through routine testing after the operation experienced a spike in bird deaths. The news comes just weeks after China banned U.S. poultry after cases of a different strain of avian flu were detected in wild birds in the Pacific Northwest. The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) will cull the remaining turkeys at the farm according to policy in order to stop the spread of the disease to other migratory or commercial birds. In 2013 California produced 13 million turkeys, and Rabobank analyst, Don Close states that this incident will “undoubtedly cause more trade disruption for the U.S.”.
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