'You live a little bit with the risk': North Carolina declared free from avian flu

In 2022, a highly pathogenic strain of avian influenza (HPAI) — commonly known as bird flu — was detected in poultry in North Carolina. But on April 25, the North Carolina Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services announced the state's poultry industry had been declared HPAI-free.

HPAI has been spreading throughout the world’s poultry population for years. Over 90 million backyard and commercial birds in 48 different states have been affected since the beginning of the outbreak in January 2022.

“Poultry is a big deal for North Carolina — it's our top agricultural commodity,” Heather Overton, assistant director of the NCDACS’ public affairs department, said. “It brings in $6.8 billion in cash receipts every year, And there's more than 976 million broilers — the chickens that are raised for meat.” 

When avian influenza is detected in a flock, the entire group must be depopulated, leading to a significant loss for farmers. In 2022, over 480,000 birds were lost to the virus in North Carolina.

However, in early April, HPAI was detected in North Carolina dairy cattle.

The only known case of HPAI in North Carolina dairy cattle was confirmed in the western part of the state, in a herd shipped from Texas in early April. Overton said that the herd was originally asymptomatic.

When the virus was detected, the affected cattle were isolated and a stop movement order was put into place to prevent infected cattle from moving in or out of the state, she said. 

While HPAI is deadly in 90 percent of poultry cases, cattle can — and often do — recover with treatment. 

Only one cattle-related human case of HPAI has been reported, and the virus is largely thought to not be a public health risk, despite low levels of the virus being detectable in commercial dairy products. This case was the first instance of mammal to human transmission.

Overton said the virus is most prevalent in birds during the spring and fall due to the migration of the wild birds that carry the disease. 

She said, sometimes, wild birds develop immunity to HPAI allowing them to survive and carry it.

“If [owned birds] come into contact with these birds through sharing the same water source or fecal matter or feed, then the owned birds can get sick, and that’s when they typically die from the virus,” she said. 

As of April 25, the state has been declared HPAI-free by the World Organization for Animal Health, allowing imports and exports of poultry products to resume both domestically and internationally. This designation does not include wild birds, and the stop movement order on cattle remains in place.

Despite the state poultry industry’s HPAI-free status, local farmers continue to grapple with the threat of HPAI. Bison farmer Jack Pleasant of Sunset Ridge Buffalo Farm said, though it is unprecedented in the bison population, he is still monitoring for the virus.

“That doesn’t mean that I think that we are immune," he said. "I just don’t know that we’ve had it, and haven’t seen any evidence of it. And, you know, we’ve had some different things over the years that we don’t know how we got, but [HPAI] is not one that we’re aware of, that we’ve seen any exposure to.”

In North Carolina, places east of Orange County — including Wake, Johnston, Wayne, Duplin, Lenoir and Onslow counties — are the most affected by HPAI.

There have been no cases detected in Orange County. The nearest case was detected in Durham County in a non-commercial flock of birds.

Poultry farmer Ben Grimes of Dawnbreaker Farms said the only poultry farmer he personally knows to have been affected by HPAI is located in California, though the farmer does sell products in North Carolina.

Currently, only four states actively have HPAI-affected flocks, and North Carolina has been free of infection since March 28. The affected herd of cattle has been isolated, and there have been no more confirmed cattle cases in the state.

Though the threat remains, many farmers continue to operate business as usual.

“I'm not going to raise my birds indoors, so it is just, you live a little bit with the risk,” Grimes said. “That's just part of the nature of it.”

@LolaOliverio

@DTHCityState | city@dailytarheel.com