>> Hi.
Welcome to the Barron Area Community Center.
My name is Mary Pardee.
I am the 4-H Youth Development Educator here in Barron County
with the UW Extension Cooperative Extension.
Tonight, our program is on the avian influenza outbreak
here in Barron County.
We have two presenters, Kelli Engen, health officer and public
health manager of the Barron County Health and Human
Services, and Tim Jergenson, our agriculture, horticulture, and
natural resource agent with UW Extension Cooperative Extension
Barron County.
So, please help me welcome our speakers.
[APPLAUSE]
>> Good evening.
Thank you for coming out tonight.
Thank you for having us.
We have had a very busy spring here in Barron County with the
outbreak of avian influenza.
Tim Jergenson, from UW Extension, and myself have
gained a really nice partnership with this unfortunate incident
that we have experienced.
And we've done this presentation a few times, and we switched it
up a little bit for all the watchers out there.
We'll start with a little map here that came from, I notice
this isn't the most current map, this came off a blog from the
poultry production.
This just gives our people a little idea
about what's going on and where these avian influenza outbreaks
have occurred.
The red indicates commercial poultry operations.
Blue is wild.
Green is domestic.
Orange is backyard flocks.
And you can see that interstate of Wisconsin we have had an
avian influenza backyard flock be hit.
This is just the numbers slide.
There have been 22, or, I'm sorry, 223 detections reported,
birds affected.
The first detection actually started in December of 2014,
and, to date, the last detection was June 17th of 2015.
Okay, this is my little chance to talk.
I'm a nurse by trade, and I like to talk a little bit about
influenza in general.
Influenza is a virus that is a respiratory illness.
A lot of people think that, oh, I had the flu.
Well, the flu is not stomach symptoms that have you in the
bathroom for hours on end.
True influenza, or the flu, is actually a respiratory illness.
So, this is where I like to do my little teaching of what
influenza truly is.
So, what do we do about this?
There are treatments for influenza virus.
Tamiflu is a drug that is fairly new to the market and, given at
early onset of the disease, can be pretty effective against
symptoms.
Prevention of seasonal flu, we in public health are big, we
encourage people to wash their hands daily, stay home when
they're sick, and get vaccinated.
That's kind of our message during the seasonal flu season.
So since this wasn't our typical seasonal flu, this was avian
influenza that we found out, I'm going to talk a little bit about
the history here.
In 1997, the World Health Organization actually
established reporting guidelines for avian influenza.
Avian influenza is not new.
It's new to this area of the country.
There were outbreaks of avian influenza in 2002, 2003, and
2004.
None of those were in Wisconsin.
They were in Texas and New York and other parts of the United
States.
So, we get into this big typing of flu, and I always tell people
I'm not the expert.
I'm not an epidemiologist.
I'm a public health nurse, so don't ask me how they come up
with these typings but they do.
There are two types of avian influenza: HPAI, which is high
pathogen, and a low pathogen avian influenza.
And within those two types there are subtypes.
We are talking a little bit today, the particular type that
we see in North America is H5N1,
and our specific strain here was H5N2.
AI is spread, we all know viruses live in feces, saliva,
respiratory secretions.
Most cases of the avian influenza will develop within
three to seven days of exposure to infected birds.
Each new strains of AI appear throughout the world on
different virus every year.
So, people say, well, public health, you guys had something
to do with this avian influenza thing that went around in Barron
County?
And we said yes, we do.
Unfortunately because of attacks that have been made on our
country and preparedness efforts
have been bolstered and boosted
and public health departments have been given
some funding to
be prepared in instances of exactly this.
Pandemic or endemic diseases, communicable diseases,
preparedness for being ready for a disaster such as a tornado, a
human or natural disaster.
So, we listened to our friends at the State Health Department,
our colleagues, our experts where the epidemiologists work,
and their recommendations were that we needed to get a good
idea of the employees from the industry where avian influenza
was detected in our area.
So, my key message is always the risk to humans is very low.
We didn't have any cases of avian influenza within humans,
but the potential is there.
So that is why we monitor the workers of the industry for 10
days after their last exposure.
We offer them prophylaxis of Tamiflu, and we watch for signs
and symptoms of a
flu virus.
Responding to the AI outbreak.
I think I'm going to hand this off to Tim Jergenson.
Normally, we kind of team this.
So...
>> Thank you, Kelli.
I think it's important as we understand and learn more about
avian influenza that there are protocols within the industry on
these farms where these diseases are found, and I'd like to spend
a little bit of time at this point talking about what some of
those protocols are.
If we understand the industry a little bit, then it helps us
understand how this disease is spread and some of the things
that we can use to deal with it.
Research has shown that the most effective way to control the
spread of avian influenza is by depopulating the disease, the
birds I should say, inside these barns.
And so that's the route that has been taken this season as we
look at how this disease is being handled on the individual
farms where it has propped up.
And so, once the birds inside these barns, and you can see an
example of the barn down in the lower right-hand corner of this,
these barns will contain anywhere from 11,000 to 15,000
birds.
So, one sick bird in one of those barns can expose a large
number.
So the entire barn is depopulated, and then the birds
are composted within the barn.
This does a couple of things.
It controls the spread of the disease because the birds
remain in the barn,
and then the carcasses are mixed with
wood chips
to create a rapid composting process.
And then, also because the birds are remaining in the barn,
they're not subject to the elements or scavengers or
anything like that that could potentially spread the disease.
One of the things that is important to understand about
avian influenza, it's not a particularly hardy virus in
terms of how it relates to temperature.
So once the composting begins, the goal is to reach 130 degrees
Fahrenheit, and that deactivates or kills the virus.
That's an important factor because when you look at
composting, even for backyard composters, it's not that
difficult to get up to 160 or 165 degrees in a compost pile.
So we find that composting is a very effective method of
controlling this disease.
So, this is the steps that are taken
when the disease is confirmed on a
poultry operation.
First of all, confirm the disease through lab tests.
So, the industry, as Kelli mentioned, this isn't a real
secret to them.
Avian influenza has been around before so they had some idea of
what the symptoms would be.
They were monitoring that, and, particularly in Wisconsin, we'd
seen this disease cropping up in some of our neighboring states,
so the industry was preparing for this and scouting for this
disease all along.
So once the disease is confirmed, those barns are
quarantined, and then Wisconsin Department of Agriculture, with
the help of the US Department of Agriculture Animal and Plant
Health Inspection Service, move in to support and partner with
the industry.
The composted remains are, as I said, stay in the barn for about
30 days.
During that time, surveillance and sampling of the composting
will occur, and they're taking temperatures.
There are Wisconsin Department of Ag officials and US
Department of Ag officials on-site doing the monitoring.
Once that composting is complete, and it's about 30
days, then the composted remains are moved outside of the barn
and stacked on the premises but away from the buildings.
The buildings are then cleaned and disinfected.
And, again, there's continuing environmental sampling going on
as these buildings go through a 21-day rest period.
Now, that period may be longer than 21 days depending on the
environmental sampling.
And so then the next step is to release the quarantine when all
the parties involved are satisfied that disease no longer
resides inside that building.
Then the buildings are restocked with poultry, and the process
begins to bring this unit back into production.
Eventually, the composted remains will be land spread at
an appropriate time.
Depending on the time of the year, they're actively growing
crops in the field, so we can't land spread the remains at that
time.
And the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources works closely
with the industry and gives them the go ahead of when and where
those composted remains can be spread.
Here is an example of some of the activity that is going on
during this process when these barns are being quarantined.
All of the trucks coming in, trucks going out, are being
cleaned.
The people that are working on those facilities are following
very strict biosecurity methods to protect themselves and also
protect from the disease spreading to another facility
So, when we look at Wisconsin, it's important to understand the
impact that this disease has had.
There have been 10 Wisconsin farms that have avian influenza
detects during the spring and the summer of 2015.
Please understand, we have over 10,000 known registered poultry
operations in Wisconsin.
So, while it's devastating to have this disease on a
particular farm, it's still a very small percentage of the
actual farms, poultry farms, that exist in Wisconsin.
Now, of those 10 farms, six of them were commercial turkey
operations, five of which were in Barron County, one in
Chippewa County.
There were three commercial chicken operations in Jefferson
County, Wisconsin.
And then there was one small backyard flock in Juneau County.
So it totaled over 650,000 turkeys that were affected.
Nearly 42,000 turkey hatching eggs had to be destroyed, and
over 1.1 million chickens were depopulated in Wisconsin.
However, that pales in comparison with some of our
neighbors.
If you look at this chart, you will see that Iowa had over
31,000, excuse me, 31 million birds that had to be
depopulated.
Most of those were turkeys, but some were egg laying hens.
Minnesota, the largest turkey producing state in the United
States, was really hit hard with over 105 farms affected, and
nearly nine million birds had to be destroyed.
You see Nebraska.
Wisconsin fits in there in the top five, and South Dakota being
the other state that was very high.
And then a number of other states were affected but at much
lower numbers.
This is a map of the United States that shows where the
layer operations are.
These blue dots indicate where chicken laying operations are.
I want to show you this because look where the concentration is.
Most of it is east of the Mississippi or just closely west
of it.
So the Upper Midwest and then some on the east coast.
Keep that concentration in mind.
Here is a concentration of the turkey industry in the United
States.
Notice, again, Minnesota being the leading state.
Wisconsin's turkey population is up in the northwestern part of
the state, primarily Barron County.
But, also, it goes down and follows the Mississippi River.
We have some on the east coast.
Again, understanding how this disease is spread helps to
understand where the concentration of the poultry
industry in the United States is.
Let's take a look now at the flyways, the major wildlife
waterfowl flyways in the United States.
And if you notice, the Mississippi flyway covers most
of the turkey producing states in the United States, or at
least the highest concentration of it, and many of the highest
concentrated areas where layer, chicken layers are, both in the
Mississippi flyway as well as the Atlantic flyway.
Why do I share that information with you?
Because, at this point, the working hypothesis is that this
disease is being spread by migrating waterfowl beginning in
the spring.
Well, if you look at when was this disease first determined,
as Kelli mentioned, it started in December, but most of the
detects were in April and early May in the Midwest, just at the
time that waterfowl were migrating.
So, the report, final report was issued by the US Department of
Agriculture's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service in
June of this year, and one of the things that they found, they
are still trying to fully understand all of the possible
pathways.
But we still believe that wild waterfowl, domestic waterfowl,
migrating are one of the primary carriers.
They may not have been the only one, but we believe that they're
the primary one.
However, once the avian influenza comes into a community
or to an area in a state, there's still some possibilities
that we don't quite understand of how it's spreading from farm
to farm.
As Kelli mentioned, it can be spread through manure or
respiratory methods of distribution.
So it's potentially possible that workers are carrying the
disease from one barn to another on their boots or on their
shoes.
That's why biosecurity is such an important issue.
But we also believe that winds or other environmental factors
are affecting the spread of this disease.
If you note, in the spring, in the Midwest, as the snowmelt
leaves, we often have high winds.
And there is some evidence that high winds are carrying this
disease from barn to barn or farm to farm once it arrives in
the community.
So, if you're one of those small flocks, which that's an
important part of your diet, you raise chickens, small flocks,
those are important contributions through eggs and
meat and sometimes provide an important part of a family's
income.
So we want to focus a little bit of time talking about how small
farm backyard flocks can be protected.
Remember, one of the flocks in Wisconsin that had this disease
was a small backyard flock.
In Iowa, I believe about six or 10 of the detects were small
backyard flocks.
So it can happen in large flocks as well as small.
The reason the numbers are so high in the commercial industry
is, remember I said there's somewhere between 10,000 and
maybe 15,000 birds in one building?
If just one bird is sick, they depopulate the entire building.
So that's why we get these really high numbers in the
commercial industry, part of the poultry industry.
It doesn't mean all those birds died of the disease.
In fact, most of them were healthy, but they had been
exposed to it so depopulating is one method of control.
So, if you're a backyard home poultry raiser, follow good
biosecurity practices.
In other words, don't visit farms that already have the
disease.
Make sure that you're following good biosecurity practices in
terms of changing your shoes, cleaning your shoes and so on.
Don't bring the disease home by going out and buying birds from
flocks that you're not sure what their production history is.
Don't share equipment with infected farms or farms that you
think may have been exposed in some other way.
And then know the warning signs.
Become familiar with the symptoms of this disease, and
once you believe you may have some of the symptoms in your
flock, report it right away to the Wisconsin Department of
Agriculture, and we have an 800 number for that.
So, what are some of the symptoms?
Well, some are somewhat generic.
A lack of energy or an appetite.
But if you're monitoring your birds on a daily basis, you'll
begin to see this.
Some swelling of the eyelids and so on.
Some purple discoloration.
Notice the turkeys down here.
That's what healthy poultry should look like.
A rich, deep red color on their waddles, combs, and so on.
It is a respiratory disease, so watch your poultry for showing
any signs of any respiratory diseases.
And, unfortunately, one of the most common symptoms of this
particular disease is sudden death.
And we've had that reported on a number of the flocks.
So, again, you monitor those flocks on a regular basis and
keep watching for these symptoms.
Again, there's a lot of help out there.
Department of Agriculture, and we have some phone numbers and
websites in which you can get a lot of your questions answered.
And, again, any suspect bird, report it right away.
So with that, we would entertain any questions that you may have
about avian influenza and the impact that it might have.
[APPLAUSE]