A commercial meat turkey flock in South Dakota is the first case of highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) in a U.S. commercial poultry operation in roughly three weeks.
The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) reported that the presence of HPAI was confirmed in a turkey flock in Hutchinson County on March 12. There were 31,200 birds affected.
The detection brings to an end a lull in new HPAI detections in commercial poultry. The last time HPAI had been confirmed in a commercial operation was on February 21, when three commercial poultry flocks in Dallas County, Missouri, were affected. Those flocks involved 28,500, 31,000 and 12,300 turkeys.
APHIS also reported another confirmed case of HPAI in Dallas County on February 23, initially reporting that the virus was found in commercial flock of 20,300 table egg layers. However, APHIS has since changed the designation from a commercial flock to WOAH (World Organisation for Animal Health) Poultry, which is the same designation the agency assigns to backyard poultry flocks.
The Hutchinson County case is the third commercial flock in South Dakota to be lost to HPAI in 2024, but the first commercial poultry flock. In January two commercial upland gamebird operations – one in Edmunds County and the other in Spink County – were confirmed detections of HPAI.
In 2023, South Dakota had more commercial flocks struck by HPAI than any other state, with 36 flocks affected. In 2022, South Dakota ranked second behind Minnesota as the state with the most commercial flocks infected. During that year, Minnesota had 81 flocks affected and South Dakota had 61.
In January, both of South Dakota’s U.S. Senators – Mike Rounds and John Thune – wrote a letter to U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack and U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai, expressing their support for an avian influenza vaccination program.
View our continuing coverage of the global avian influenza situation.
To learn more about HPAI cases in commercial poultry flocks in the United States, Mexico and Canada, see an interactive map on WATTPoultry.com.
