Recent developments could suggest that bird flu is a new or future danger if you’ve been heeding only the reassurances from animal agribusiness that we can continue with the status quo—and that its products are safe to consume. Yet, we have been warned and warned and warned by public health experts that, in bird flu, we could face the next pandemic.
Factory farms—intensive operations that dominate the U.S. food system and raise over 99 percent of the nation’s farmed animals—are breeding grounds for not just bird flu but other pathogens. Animals are crowded in the thousands or even over one million in often windowless sheds filled with their waste. In these facilities, animals and workers alike are vulnerable to disease.
Yet, much of the animal agriculture industry has stubbornly and recklessly refused to perform adequate testing of workers and animals. In December, the USDA ordered the testing of raw milk, which is not heated to eliminate harmful pathogens and bacteria before consumption. However, this is not enough to address the dangers posed by the mass farming of animals and not enough to offer the full picture of bird flu’s spread.
“Without a clearer understanding of the extent of exposure, infection, viral evolution, and transmission, we will be unable to properly protect our communities from a pathogen that has proven to be a formidable challenge to human and animal health,” reads the report in the New England Journal of Medicine.
