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New funding is being made available to help in the efforts to stamp out H5N1. Rusty Halvorson has more details.
The Biden administration recently announced it would award $306 million more to address avian influenza cases in humans, especially livestock workers.
The New York Times noted the timing of the funding reflects concerns among senior health officials that the incoming Trump administration might move to cut the budgets of major health agencies.
USDA’s H5N1 Monitoring Program set a lofty goal of eradicating the virus from U.S. dairy herds.
Lucas Sjostrom, head of the government affairs team at Edge Dairy Cooperative, says the average producer shouldn’t feel much impact from the program.
“Unless, of course, their herd is positive and they wouldn’t have found that before. That’s maybe good monitoring, maybe catch things faster and USDA has stated that their goal is to stamp this out.”
While U.S. dairy farmers support the idea of eradicating H5N1, Sjostrom says there are some concerns about how to do it.
“Well, we’re most resistant to is, just making sure that the ends and the means match up. What is the goal here? Okay, USDA wants to stamp this disease out – everybody wants this out. Dairy farmers, our poultry industry, we would all love this disease not to be affecting us. But what’s the best and most effective way to do that? That’s where we’re trying to help our processors, and ultimately our farmers, figure out.”