August 2022 Update on Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza

by Amy Barkley, Livestock Specialist with the CCE SWNY Dairy, Livestock and Field Crops Team and HPAI Subject Matter Expert

August 12th, 2022 

The last major update regarding Avian Influenza (HPAI) in the state was recorded on April 6th, which corresponds to the last outbreak in a poultry flock. With this case, the 8 affected flocks have totaled 9,500 birds. Seven of the flocks were backyard flocks, and one was commercial. This is in comparison to the cumulative totals we've seen across the country, with 400 affected flocks (211 of those were backyard, 189 were commercial) and 40.14 million birds affected across 39 states. In part because of the efforts NYS has taken to secure poultry through increased biosecurity measures, the state's losses to date only account for 0.02% of the nation's affected bird population and 2% of affected flocks.

In the past month, most of the outbreaks in domestic poultry have stayed in the Western U.S., with some in the Midwest and a few on the East Coast, including Florida and Maine. That doesn't mean that the virus isn't circulating nearby. Recorded wild bird deaths indicate that the virus is still active on the East Coast. Interestingly, the number of wild waterfowl deaths seems to be giving way to an increased percentage of raptor and scavenger mortalities. July saw the continuing trend of decreasing wild bird mortalities from the peak in May. There were 147 total in the country for July. Of those, 73% were from Eastern states and 14% were from NYS and surrounding states.

With the 2014/2015 HPAI outbreak, the country was deemed free of the virus by June of 2015 after the first detection was found in December of the previous year. Warmer temperatures and stronger solar radiation helped contribute to a rapid virus destruction. However, this outbreak has not seen the same remission timeline. Since it's still circulating, the concern moving into the late summer is that the virus will persist into the fall, resulting in it being spread again by wild birds as they begin their fall migration.

At this point, the disease transfer into commercial poultry and backyard flocks is relatively low, but still a real possibility. We need to maintain biosecurity measures such as keeping domesticated birds away from wild birds, limiting the number of visitors in our poultry facilities, and wearing clean clothing in-between taking care of flocks on different properties. More information can be found in the Cornell CALS HPAI fact sheet.

Cornell Cooperative Extension and NY-EDEN will continue to share updates on the outbreak. If you are a flock owner or community member with questions, please reach out to your local Cornell Cooperative Extension office for assistance. Media inquiries can be directed to Cornell Cooperative Extension Communications at cce-communications@cornell.edu.

The Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza response in NYS is being addressed by Cornell Cooperative Extension's NY Extension Disaster Education Network.

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Figure 1. USDA-APHIS map showing HPAI detections in wild birds by state. The last update to this map was on August 9, 2022.

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Figure 2. Bar chart from USDA-APHIS depicting the number of outbreaks in commercial and backyard flocks as well as the number of domesticated poultry affected by month. This chart was last updated August 11, 2022.