USDA’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service has expanded wild bird surveillance for avian influenza. Julianna Lenoch with APHIS tells Brownfield the gathering of data in the central and Mississippi River flyways began before the Indiana H5N1 detection. “With our Canadian colleagues reporting avian influenza high-path H5N1 at the end of December, and our subsequent work and ongoing efforts in the Atlantic flyway, we had advance knowledge that the virus was circulating in wild bird populations.”
Lenoch says wild bird samples come from hunters, live bird captures, the removal of nuisance wild birds, and more.
