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Urge the Agency to Better Protect Animals From Bird Flu!

Dear John,

In early 2022, highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI), a.k.a. "bird flu," once again began infecting chickens, turkeys, and other farmed birds around the globe. While previous HPAI outbreaks have typically slowed or stopped during warm summer weather, the current outbreak has persisted for over a year with no end in sight. Since the start of the outbreak, nearly 60 million farmed birds in the United States have been "depopulated" (killed en masse) in an attempt to prevent disease spread. Despite these efforts, bird flu is continuing to infect and kill not only domestic poultry but also many species of wild birds and mammals (even threatening some with extinction) and there is increasing concern about its potential to cause a human pandemic.

Conditions on industrial farms provide the perfect breeding ground for viruses like HPAI. The intensive confinement of tens or even hundreds of thousands of genetically similar birds in a single building, often in unhygienic and highly stressful settings, increases the risk of disease mutation and transmission. Additionally, it is almost impossible for operations of this size to respond and depopulate birds in a way that doesn't result in immense animal suffering. In fact, the situation has led to the increased use of one of the most inhumane methods of depopulation available: "ventilation shutdown plus heat" (VSD+), which involves killing birds by heatstroke over several agonizing hours (similar to what pets experience when locked in a hot car).

Although heatstroke-based depopulation methods were initially devised only for extreme circumstances, 77% of birds impacted by HPAI from the start of the outbreak through March 2023 were killed in depopulation events where VSD+ was either the sole method or one of multiple methods used. The US Department of Agriculture oversees the response to HPAI and provides compensation to producers for HPAI-related losses using taxpayer dollars. Despite the large number of birds impacted, the USDA has done little to protect animal welfare during this crisis. The department must act to better protect animal welfare and ensure that VSD+ is no longer relied on to address the bird flu outbreak, especially as taxpayers foot the bill.

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What You Can Do
Please urge the USDA to prioritize animal welfare by incentivizing the development and use of more humane depopulation methods, setting caps on the number and stocking density of birds at production facilities, and advancing HPAI vaccination strategies that help protect against future outbreaks ([link removed]).

Be sure to share our action alert with family, friends, and co-workers and encourage them to take meaningful action too. As always, thank you very much for your help!

Sincerely,

Allie Granger, Policy Associate
Farmed Animal Program

P.S. Follow us on Facebook ([link removed]), Twitter ([link removed]), and Instagram ([link removed]) for other important animal protection actions and news. Check out the latest edition of the AWI Quarterly ([link removed])!

Photo by Farm Sanctuary

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Animal Welfare Institute
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The Animal Welfare Institute is a not-for-profit organization, founded in 1951 and dedicated to reducing animal suffering caused by people. We seek better treatment of animals everywhere: in the laboratory, on the farm, in commerce, at home, and in the wild.

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