by Michael Snyder, The Economic Collapse Blog:

Officials had been greatly puzzled by a “mystery disease” that has been making dairy cattle in Texas, Kansas and New Mexico very sluggish and has been causing them to produce much less milk.  So they decided to do some testing, and we now have the results.  It turns out that the mystery illness is actually “the same strain of Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza (HPAI) that’s been in the U.S. for two years”…

A mystery illness that’s impacted dairy herds in the Texas Panhandle, New Mexico and Kansas now has a diagnosis: Influenza A. USDA says genetic sequencing revealed it’s the same strain of Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza (HPAI) that’s been in the U.S. for two years.

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APHIS says the “National Veterinary Services Laboratories” detected Influenza “A” in samples from several impacted herds in Texas, Kansas and New Mexico. The virus is carried by wild waterfowl, which experts think is how the illness is spreading.

The experts did not think that bird flu would be a threat to dairy cattle.

Unfortunately, the experts were wrong.

Scientists were able to confirm the presence of the bird flu by testing samples of milk from sick cows…

According to USDA, as of March 25, unpasteurized, clinical samples of milk from sick cattle collected from two dairy farms in Kansas and one in Texas, as well as an oropharyngeal swab from another dairy in Texas, have tested positive for the virus.

Now that bird flu has been identified as the culprit, dairy farmers are being urged to strictly implement “all standard biosecurity measures”…

Officials are strongly advising dairy producers to use all standard biosecurity measures. They note it’s important for producers to clean and disinfect all livestock watering devices and isolate drinking water where it might be contaminated by waterfowl. Farmers are also being asked to notify their herd veterinarian if they suspect any cattle within their herd are displaying symptoms of this condition.

I was quite shocked to learn that this was happening right here in our own country.

The good news is that all milk from sick cows is being kept out of the food chain…

“Also, routine testing and well-established protocols for U.S. dairy will continue to ensure that only safe milk enters the food supply. In keeping with the federal Grade ‘A’ Pasteurized Milk Ordinance (PMO), milk from sick cows must be collected separately and is not allowed to enter the food supply chain. This means affected dairy cows are segregated, as is normal practice with any animal health concern, and their milk does not enter the food supply. Consumers in the United States and around the world can remain confident in the safety and quality of U.S. dairy,” the statement said.

Will we eventually get to a point where entire herds of dairy cows have to be killed in order to prevent the spread of the disease?

Let’s hope not.

Earlier this month, we learned that a goat in Minnesota has also tested positive for bird flu…

A goat in Stevens County, Minnesota, has tested positive for highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI), becoming the first U.S. detection of HPAI in a domestic ruminant. The goat contracted the virus after a poultry flock on the same premises was depopulated in February due to the virus. Following the confirmation of HPAI in the goat, the Minnesota Board of Animal Health quarantined all other species on the premises. The Board said is working with USDA to investigate the transmission of the virus in this case.

It appears to be just a matter of time before the bird flu starts becoming a significant threat to humans as well.

According to Dr. Chris Walzer, “dozens of mammalian species” have already been infected…

In January, Dr Chris Walzer, the Wildlife Conservation Society’s Executive Director of Health, in a statement, said: “It (H5N1) has infected over 150 wild and domestic avian species around the globe as well as dozens of mammalian species. The bird flu outbreak is the worst globally and also in US history, with hundreds-of-millions of birds dead since it first turned up in domestic waterfowl in China in 1996.”

We better hope that the bird flu does not mutate into a form that can spread very easily among humans.

Because according to the NIH, bird flu can have a death rate of more than 50 percent in humans…

As of November 2022, 240 cases of human avian influenza A (H5N1) virus have been confirmed from the Western Pacific Region since 2003 with a case fatality rate of 56%.

A global bird flu crisis would be far worse than anything that we have experienced during the past several years.

Just try to imagine the panic that would ensue if H5N1 were to start killing millions of people around the world.

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