After a nearly two-month-long stretch without any new instances of highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) in U.S. commercial poultry, the presence of the virus was confirmed in a California turkey flock on September 18.
The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) posted on its website that a commercial meat turkey flock in Merced County was affected. The number of turkeys in the flock has not yet been disclosed.
Prior to this flock infection, there had not been detections of HPAI in a commercial poultry flock in the United States since July 19, according to information from APHIS.
In that instance, a flock of 300,800 commercial table egg pullets in Weld County, Colorado, was affected. The control area surrounding that flock was released on August 27.
California, however, had not had any confirmed cases in commercial poultry since January 18, when a commercial table egg pullet flock, also in Merced County, was affected. That flock involved 285,600 birds.
According to the California Department of Food and Agriculture (CDFA), the state had been declared free from H5N1 HPAI in poultry on June 28 after completely fulfilling the necessary actions and surveillance requirements.
Despite the lack of H5N1 in commercial poultry in California for those months, the virus has been detected in 10 commercial dairy operations in the state. According to APHIS, the first three of those instances were confirmed on August 30, and the most recent cases were confirmed on September 13.
APHIS and CDFA have not identified the counties where H5N1 was confirmed in cattle.
Despite the new case of HPAI in commercial poultry in the United States, it has been seven months since any new HPAI detections in commercial poultry have been confirmed in Canada.
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.
