As the H5N1 influenza debacle at the Universal Ostrich Farm in British Columbia finally comes to a close, part of me wants to ignore all the crap that’s coming in, but there’s value in recapping this incident in an effort to help move us forward.
Recap: A large flock of captive ostriches was found
Universal Ostriches. It’s been a ride.
I was involved early in the saga of the H5N1 influenza outbreak on this ostrich farm in BC, answering some questions about the situation and potential options, but eventually stepped back from commenting much as things went off the rails, in part to avoid the flurry of threats
My post earlier this week about culling considerations for control of disease outbreaks in animals generated some good discussion and ideas (and a surprisingly small number of “you’re an idiot” emails). Although that post was focused primarily on culling in response to influenza outbreaks, we can also think about it little more broadly
The recent situation has raised more discussion about the role of mass culling in response to H5N1 influenza infection in domestic / captive birds. After H5N1 flu was identified on an ostrich farm in British Columbia, the CFIA ordered all 400 birds to be culled, but the owner is trying to find options to preserve
A presumptive case of H5 avian influenza has been reported in a teenager from British Columbia. Confirmatory testing is underway. Very little additional information has been released, so it’s hard to say how surprising and concerning it is. Information vacuums like this often lead to excessive speculation, but information sharing has to be balanced with
A lot of infectious disease events get over-hyped by the media, which makes it a bit surprising that this case has flown a bit under the radar. It’s not a sign of an impending “influenza apocalypse,” but it’s a warning sign that more may be going on lately with flu viruses than we’ve been able
When mpox (formerly monkeypox) started to surge in Ontario back in 2022, I set up a study to try to look at possible human-to-pet transmission of the causative virus (known as MPXV), because we have very little information about the potential risks to pets, and their potential role in transmission. By the time we got
The Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment recently released information about 6 cats in the state diagnosed with H5N1 influenza. Some aspects of these cases are totally unsurprising, others raise a lot of questions.
Colorado has been hit hard by H5N1 in dairy cattle, with over 50 herds affected since the spring
I spend a lot of time talking to people about leptospirosis in dogs and the risks to people. From a zoonotic disease standpoint, I spend half my time trying to raise awareness of the potential for transmission of this bacterium from infected dogs to people. I spend the other half trying to talk people off
There’s a great new early-release paper in Emerging Infectious Diseases (Oguzie et al. 2024) about the emerging situation with H5N1 influenza in dairy cattle. It provides some important new information, and more details that somewhat challenge the early narrative.
The authors explain some of the limitations of the study to keep in
