{"id":6450,"date":"2024-04-24T10:21:23","date_gmt":"2024-04-24T15:21:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/?p=6450"},"modified":"2024-04-24T10:21:27","modified_gmt":"2024-04-24T15:21:27","slug":"u-s-government-in-hot-seat-for-response-to-growing-cow-flu-outbreak","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/2024\/04\/24\/u-s-government-in-hot-seat-for-response-to-growing-cow-flu-outbreak\/","title":{"rendered":"U.S. government in hot seat for response to growing cow flu outbreak"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"panel body-content\"><div class=\"panel__container\">\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.science.org\/content\/article\/u-s-government-hot-seat-response-growing-cow-flu-outbreak\">Science<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Veterinarians and researchers on the front lines say it has taken too long to share data on viral changes, spread, and milk safety. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In early March, veterinarian Barb Petersen noticed the dairy cows she cared for on a Texas farm looked sick and produced less milk, and that it was off-color and thick. Birds and cats on the farm were dying, too. Petersen contacted Kay Russo at Novonesis, a company that helps farms keep their animals healthy and productive. \u201cI said, you know, I may sound like a crazy, tinfoil hat\u2013wearing person,\u201d Russo, also a veterinarian, recalled at a 5 April public talk sponsored by her company. \u201cBut this sounds a bit like influenza to me.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>She was right, as Petersen and Russo soon learned. On 19 March, birds on the Texas farm tested positive for H5N1, the highly pathogenic avian flu that has been devastating poultry and wild birds around the world for more than 2 years. Two days later, tests of cow milk and cats came back positive for the same virus, designated 2.3.4.4b. \u201cI was at Target with my kids, and a series of expletives came out of my mouth,\u201d Russo said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Now, 3 weeks into the first ever outbreak of a bird flu virus in dairy cattle, Russo and others are still dismayed\u2014this time by the many questions that remain about the infections and the threat they may pose to livestock and people, and by the federal response. Eight U.S. states have reported infected cows, but government scientists have released few details about how the virus is spreading. In the face of mounting criticism about sharing little genetic data\u2014which could indicate how the virus is changing and its potential for further spread\u2014the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) did an unusual\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.aphis.usda.gov\/livestock-poultry-disease\/avian\/avian-influenza\/usda-publishes-h5n1-influenza-virus-genetic\">Sunday evening dump<\/a>on 21 April of 202 sequences from cattle into a public database. (Some may be different samples from the same animal.) And despite public reassurances about the safety of the country\u2019s milk supply, officials have yet to provide supporting data.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.science.org\/content\/article\/u-s-government-hot-seat-response-growing-cow-flu-outbreak\">Continue reading<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Science Veterinarians and researchers on the front lines say it has taken too long to share data on viral changes, spread, and milk safety. In early March, veterinarian Barb Petersen noticed the dairy cows she cared for on a Texas farm looked sick and produced less milk, and that it was off-color and thick. Birds [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6450","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-featured-headlines"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6450","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6450"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6450\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6451,"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6450\/revisions\/6451"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6450"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6450"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6450"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}