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(Des Moines, IA) -- The Iowa Department of Agriculture is reminding poultry and dairy producers to watch for avian influenza. Iowa Ag Secretary Mike Naig says there are no cases in Iowa at this time. There are bird flu cases in several other states, most of those are in commercial or backyard poultry. Iowa's last bird flu case in a commercial flock was last November. There was also a case in a backyard flock in December. Several states have now confirmed infections in dairy cattle, Iowa has NOT had a case in dairy cattle. There have also been two human cases. The C-D-C states the threat to humans remains low.
Spring migration is underway and the Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship is strongly reminding Iowa poultry producers and dairy farmers to bolster their biosecurity practices and protocols to protect their flocks and herds. The Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship has biosecurity recommendations for dairy herds to utilize. In addition, the Department has numerous other biosecurity resources for poultry producers and livestock farms to reference on its website.
“Heightened biosecurity on both poultry and cattle farms is critically important to keeping our livestock healthy. We would strongly recommend farmers work with their veterinarian and have a very good understanding of the health status of any herd that they are receiving any cattle from,” said State Veterinarian Dr. Jeff Kaisand. “Veterinarians, poultry producers with sick birds or dairy farmers seeing unusual or suspicious illnesses should report them to the Department at 515-281-5305.”
Eight states have recently confirmed cases of highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) in a dairy herd, after the U.S. Department of Agriculture reported infections in North Carolina, South Dakota, Texas, Kansas, Ohio, Michigan, Idaho and New Mexico.