Bird flu has infected more than 200 mammals since outbreaks began two years ago, from a polar bear in Alaska to a red fox in Maine, but “it’s not been a problem” for hog farmers, said Scott Hays, past president of the National Pork Producers Council, on Monday. “I don’t anticipate it being an issue for our industry, but [it’s] certainly a watch-out for us.”
The H5N1 bird flu virus has been confirmed in 17 dairy herds, nine of them in Texas, and a dairy worker contracted a mild form of highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI).
Authorities say bird flu poses a low risk to human health, although this is the first time it has been found in U.S. cattle. The CDC says genetic sequencing of samples from dairy cows and from the farmworker showed the virus “for the most part lacks changes that would make [it] better adapted to infect mammals.”
“Obviously, it’s something that is on our radar,” said Hays during an online NPPC news conference. “We don’t feel like it’s a huge threat to our industry by any stretch of the imagination but…we would encourage producers to continue to look at their biosecurity plan to keep all diseases out of their farms. This one would be no different.”
Biosecurity guidelines call for steps such as preventing outsiders from entering livestock barns, using a footbath to sanitize footwear before entering a barn, and not sharing equipment between farms. For the past few years, African swine fever has been the global disease of concern in the pork industry.
NPPC leaders said they continue to seek a “federal solution” to California’s Prop 12 animal welfare law, which requires farmers to give breeding sows 24 square feet of floor space apiece and which bans the import of uncooked cuts of pork from farms outside of the state that do not comply with the state law.
“The goal is the 2024 farm bill,” said NPPC chief executive Brian Humphreys. “This really needs to be a bipartisan solution” that avoids a hodgepodge of differing state regulations. “There are a lot of options this could take.”
The NPPC opposed Prop 12 from the start and lost a Supreme Court challenge to it last May. Described as the strongest state law on animal welfare, Prop 12 effectively bans widely used “sow crates,” which greatly restrict a sow’s movements, on farms that supply California consumers. Pork processors say Prop 12 complicates the paperwork and adds costs to hog slaughter and marketing of pork products.
Preliminary data suggest Prop 12 “and the uncertainty surrounding it” led to a 20 percent increase in the average grocery store price of the pork cuts that were covered by the law, said the University of California. “The initial price impacts were higher than would be expected after full adjustment, with price increases of 16 percent for bacon and 41 percent for pork loin.”
“The things that we predicted would happen with Prop 12 and excessive regulations are occurring,” said NPPC president Lori Stevermer, of Minnesota, pointing to “chaos and higher food prices.”
Prop 12 was approved by voters in a landslide in 2018 and took full effect on Jan. 1, seven months after the Supreme Court decision. Massachusetts voters approved animal welfare standards that are similar to California’s in a 2016 referendum. New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy enacted a law last July that bans sow crates and veal-calf stalls. The Humane Society of the United States said New Jersey was the 15th state to ban sow crates, veal stalls, or “battery” cages for egg-laying hens.