The presence of highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) was confirmed in a commercial meat turkey flock in Meeker County, Minnesota.
The case was confirmed on April 11, 2024, according to the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS). The affected flock involved 70,100 turkeys.
This marks the first instance of HPAI in a commercial poultry flock in Minnesota of 2024. The last case for the state was confirmed on December 27, 2023. In that case, 78,800 commercial meat turkeys in Todd County were affected.
However, there have been other instances of the same variant of the H5N1 in the state this year, including three backyard poultry flocks and one goat herd. The goats were on the same premises as one of the infected backyard flocks. Cases of H5N1 in goats or backyard flocks, however, should not have an impact on international poultry trade, according to World Organisation for Animal Health (WOAH) standards.
The last time a commercial flock on Meeker County was struck by HPAI was October 31, 2023. The county had four commercial flocks infected in 2023 and eight commercial flocks infected in 2022.
Since the 2022-24 HPAI outbreak in the United States began, no state has lost more commercial poultry flocks to HPAI than Minnesota. The state had 81 flocks affected in 2022 and 34 flocks affected in 2023.
To learn more about HPAI cases in commercial poultry flocks in the United States, Mexico and Canada, see an interactive map on WATTPoultry.com.
View our continuing coverage of the global avian influenza situation.
