USDA announces a new Dairy Influenza testing strategy

Post by RonO
https://www.usda.gov/media/press-releases/2024/12/06/usda-announces-new-
federal-order-begins-national-milk-testing
The USDA is finally going to do what needed to be done at the beginning
of the dairy influenza epidemic. They are still calling it avian
influenza when it has been primarily a dairy infection since March.
Things have just gotten to the point where stupidity and politics can't
stop them from doing the right thing any longer.
They are going to start a national milk testing program that will force
the states with infected herds to admit that they have infected herds
and start them doing something about it. They need to protect dairy
workers and poultry flocks from getting infected by the dairy virus.
The CDC's own research in late October indicated that the dairy H5N1
genotype B3.13 could survive the most common pasteurization method and
remain infective for at least 4 days in refrigerated whole milk. The
FDA went into denial, but claimed to start another milk testing program,
but implemented the wrong testing protocol to determine if there was an
issue with the milk supply. Instead of going to plants accepting
contaminated milk and testing the raw milk before pasteurization and
then after pasteurization in order to determine what went in and what
came out they asked for volunteer production facilities and volunteer
dairies that wanted their milk tested. This was obviously stupid, but
they did it, and never have announced any results from the program. They
haven't even claimed that they got enough volunteers to do an effective
study. They probably needed to test up to a hundred plants handling
infected milk, using various procedures to pasteurize their milk, and
they needed to test them multiple times during the days production, and
on multiple different days of the week. They needed to determine if
there was any stage of production that could be compromized and let
infective milk enter the food supply during stages like shift changes,
maintenance, cleaning, and restart.
The Missouri patient and the child that got infected by the dairy virus
in California are possible cases of infection due to ingestion of dairy
products. The CDC claims that they do not know how the patients were
infected, but their only contact with dairy cattle was the milk that
they drank. The milk supply might be 99% safe, but it is that 1% that
could have been an issue in California and Missouri.
It will be important to know if infective virus is surviving in the milk
supply if the virus does mutate to better infect humans, but the FDA is
not doing what they should be doing. Why would any regulatory agency
rely on volunteers when the ones that will not volunteer are the most
likely to have the issues that they are looking for?
Ron Okimoto

https://www.tri-cityherald.com/news/business/health-care/article296704124.html

This Washington State news paper is asking why Washington with 11
infected poultry workers was left off the list for starting bulk milk
tank testing. They aren't the only affected left off the initial list.
a month ago the USDA claimed that they were going to initiate bulk milk
tank testing in states with known infected herds within 30 days, but
that may not have happened. There have been no updates on that project.
I think that they announced that project around Nov. 7.

The USDA just announced a national program and are planning to start
with Oregon, California, Colorado, Michigan, Mississippi, and
Pennsylvania. Colorado has already done several rounds of bulk milk
tank testing of their dairies since they were infected and identified
the second most number of infected dairies, but are way behind
California in the number of infected herds, mainly because it looks like
they contained the infection by identifying their infected herds.
Oregon, Mississippi, and Pennsylvania have not yet adimitted to having
infected herds. So why has the USDA left out Missouri and Washington
that have had infected human patients?

What happened to the program that was supposed to have started by now in
the states with known infected herds? What will happen with this
current program? Those are the questions that the USDA should be answering.

Ron Okimoto

erik simpson

2024-12-07 17:40:14 UTC

https://www.usda.gov/media/press-releases/2024/12/06/usda-announces-new- federal-order-begins-national-milk-testing
The USDA is finally going to do what needed to be done at the
beginning of the dairy influenza epidemic. They are still calling it
avian influenza when it has been primarily a dairy infection since
March. Things have just gotten to the point where stupidity and
politics can't stop them from doing the right thing any longer.
They are going to start a national milk testing program that will
force the states with infected herds to admit that they have infected
herds and start them doing something about it. They need to protect
dairy workers and poultry flocks from getting infected by the dairy
virus.
The CDC's own research in late October indicated that the dairy H5N1
genotype B3.13 could survive the most common pasteurization method and
remain infective for at least 4 days in refrigerated whole milk. The
FDA went into denial, but claimed to start another milk testing
program, but implemented the wrong testing protocol to determine if
there was an issue with the milk supply. Instead of going to plants
accepting contaminated milk and testing the raw milk before
pasteurization and then after pasteurization in order to determine
what went in and what came out they asked for volunteer production
facilities and volunteer dairies that wanted their milk tested. This
was obviously stupid, but they did it, and never have announced any
results from the program. They haven't even claimed that they got
enough volunteers to do an effective study. They probably needed to
test up to a hundred plants handling infected milk, using various
procedures to pasteurize their milk, and they needed to test them
multiple times during the days production, and on multiple different
days of the week. They needed to determine if there was any stage of
production that could be compromized and let infective milk enter the
food supply during stages like shift changes, maintenance, cleaning,
and restart.
The Missouri patient and the child that got infected by the dairy
virus in California are possible cases of infection due to ingestion
of dairy products. The CDC claims that they do not know how the
patients were infected, but their only contact with dairy cattle was
the milk that they drank. The milk supply might be 99% safe, but it
is that 1% that could have been an issue in California and Missouri.
It will be important to know if infective virus is surviving in the
milk supply if the virus does mutate to better infect humans, but the
FDA is not doing what they should be doing. Why would any regulatory
agency rely on volunteers when the ones that will not volunteer are
the most likely to have the issues that they are looking for?
Ron Okimoto

https://www.tri-cityherald.com/news/business/health-care/article296704124.html
This Washington State news paper is asking why Washington with 11
infected poultry workers was left off the list for starting bulk milk
tank testing. They aren't the only affected left off the initial list.
a month ago the USDA claimed that they were going to initiate bulk milk
tank testing in states with known infected herds within 30 days, but
that may not have happened. There have been no updates on that project.
I think that they announced that project around Nov. 7.
The USDA just announced a national program and are planning to start
with Oregon, California, Colorado, Michigan, Mississippi, and
Pennsylvania. Colorado has already done several rounds of bulk milk
tank testing of their dairies since they were infected and identified
the second most number of infected dairies, but are way behind
California in the number of infected herds, mainly because it looks like
they contained the infection by identifying their infected herds.
Oregon, Mississippi, and Pennsylvania have not yet adimitted to having
infected herds. So why has the USDA left out Missouri and Washington
that have had infected human patients?
What happened to the program that was supposed to have started by now in
the states with known infected herds? What will happen with this
current program? Those are the questions that the USDA should be
answering.
Ron Okimoto

It's good see USDA taking an interest in these infections. The CDC
seemed like they weren't paying much attention to the infected birds,
cattle, etc.

RonO

2024-12-07 18:34:30 UTC

Post by RonO
https://www.usda.gov/media/press-releases/2024/12/06/usda-announces-
new- federal-order-begins-national-milk-testing
The USDA is finally going to do what needed to be done at the
beginning of the dairy influenza epidemic. They are still calling it
avian influenza when it has been primarily a dairy infection since
March. Things have just gotten to the point where stupidity and
politics can't stop them from doing the right thing any longer.
They are going to start a national milk testing program that will
force the states with infected herds to admit that they have infected
herds and start them doing something about it. They need to protect
dairy workers and poultry flocks from getting infected by the dairy
virus.
The CDC's own research in late October indicated that the dairy H5N1
genotype B3.13 could survive the most common pasteurization method
and remain infective for at least 4 days in refrigerated whole milk.
The FDA went into denial, but claimed to start another milk testing
program, but implemented the wrong testing protocol to determine if
there was an issue with the milk supply. Instead of going to plants
accepting contaminated milk and testing the raw milk before
pasteurization and then after pasteurization in order to determine
what went in and what came out they asked for volunteer production
facilities and volunteer dairies that wanted their milk tested. This
was obviously stupid, but they did it, and never have announced any
results from the program. They haven't even claimed that they got
enough volunteers to do an effective study. They probably needed to
test up to a hundred plants handling infected milk, using various
procedures to pasteurize their milk, and they needed to test them
multiple times during the days production, and on multiple different
days of the week. They needed to determine if there was any stage of
production that could be compromized and let infective milk enter the
food supply during stages like shift changes, maintenance, cleaning,
and restart.
The Missouri patient and the child that got infected by the dairy
virus in California are possible cases of infection due to ingestion
of dairy products. The CDC claims that they do not know how the
patients were infected, but their only contact with dairy cattle was
the milk that they drank. The milk supply might be 99% safe, but it
is that 1% that could have been an issue in California and Missouri.
It will be important to know if infective virus is surviving in the
milk supply if the virus does mutate to better infect humans, but the
FDA is not doing what they should be doing. Why would any regulatory
agency rely on volunteers when the ones that will not volunteer are
the most likely to have the issues that they are looking for?
Ron Okimoto

https://www.tri-cityherald.com/news/business/health-care/
article296704124.html
This Washington State news paper is asking why Washington with 11
infected poultry workers was left off the list for starting bulk milk
tank testing. They aren't the only affected left off the initial
list. a month ago the USDA claimed that they were going to initiate
bulk milk tank testing in states with known infected herds within 30
days, but that may not have happened. There have been no updates on
that project. I think that they announced that project around Nov. 7.
The USDA just announced a national program and are planning to start
with Oregon, California, Colorado, Michigan, Mississippi, and
Pennsylvania. Colorado has already done several rounds of bulk milk
tank testing of their dairies since they were infected and identified
the second most number of infected dairies, but are way behind
California in the number of infected herds, mainly because it looks
like they contained the infection by identifying their infected herds.
Oregon, Mississippi, and Pennsylvania have not yet adimitted to having
infected herds. So why has the USDA left out Missouri and Washington
that have had infected human patients?
What happened to the program that was supposed to have started by now
in the states with known infected herds? What will happen with this
current program? Those are the questions that the USDA should be
answering.
Ron Okimoto

It's good see USDA taking an interest in these infections. The CDC
seemed like they weren't paying much attention to the infected birds,
cattle, etc.

Both the CDC and USDA have been pretending that the dairy epidemic would
just go away if they pretended hard enough, but reality is catching up
with them. The CDC already announced a program to start testing dairy
workers a couple weeks ago, but nothing has come of it. Nothing came of
the USDA's first announcement that they were going to start testing
dairies in states with known infections from a month ago. That attempt
may have failed to get started, so they are claiming that they are going
to start this effort. It has been a fiasco for both the CDC and the
USDA from the start in March.

Ron Okimoto

erik simpson

2024-12-07 18:42:03 UTC

Post by RonO
https://www.usda.gov/media/press-releases/2024/12/06/usda-announces-
new- federal-order-begins-national-milk-testing
The USDA is finally going to do what needed to be done at the
beginning of the dairy influenza epidemic. They are still calling
it avian influenza when it has been primarily a dairy infection
since March. Things have just gotten to the point where stupidity
and politics can't stop them from doing the right thing any longer.
They are going to start a national milk testing program that will
force the states with infected herds to admit that they have
infected herds and start them doing something about it. They need
to protect dairy workers and poultry flocks from getting infected by
the dairy virus.
The CDC's own research in late October indicated that the dairy H5N1
genotype B3.13 could survive the most common pasteurization method
and remain infective for at least 4 days in refrigerated whole milk.
The FDA went into denial, but claimed to start another milk testing
program, but implemented the wrong testing protocol to determine if
there was an issue with the milk supply. Instead of going to plants
accepting contaminated milk and testing the raw milk before
pasteurization and then after pasteurization in order to determine
what went in and what came out they asked for volunteer production
facilities and volunteer dairies that wanted their milk tested.
This was obviously stupid, but they did it, and never have announced
any results from the program. They haven't even claimed that they
got enough volunteers to do an effective study. They probably
needed to test up to a hundred plants handling infected milk, using
various procedures to pasteurize their milk, and they needed to test
them multiple times during the days production, and on multiple
different days of the week. They needed to determine if there was
any stage of production that could be compromized and let infective
milk enter the food supply during stages like shift changes,
maintenance, cleaning, and restart.
The Missouri patient and the child that got infected by the dairy
virus in California are possible cases of infection due to ingestion
of dairy products. The CDC claims that they do not know how the
patients were infected, but their only contact with dairy cattle was
the milk that they drank. The milk supply might be 99% safe, but it
is that 1% that could have been an issue in California and Missouri.
It will be important to know if infective virus is surviving in the
milk supply if the virus does mutate to better infect humans, but
the FDA is not doing what they should be doing. Why would any
regulatory agency rely on volunteers when the ones that will not
volunteer are the most likely to have the issues that they are
looking for?
Ron Okimoto

https://www.tri-cityherald.com/news/business/health-care/
article296704124.html
This Washington State news paper is asking why Washington with 11
infected poultry workers was left off the list for starting bulk milk
tank testing. They aren't the only affected left off the initial
list. a month ago the USDA claimed that they were going to initiate
bulk milk tank testing in states with known infected herds within 30
days, but that may not have happened. There have been no updates on
that project. I think that they announced that project around Nov. 7.
The USDA just announced a national program and are planning to start
with Oregon, California, Colorado, Michigan, Mississippi, and
Pennsylvania. Colorado has already done several rounds of bulk milk
tank testing of their dairies since they were infected and identified
the second most number of infected dairies, but are way behind
California in the number of infected herds, mainly because it looks
like they contained the infection by identifying their infected
herds. Oregon, Mississippi, and Pennsylvania have not yet adimitted
to having infected herds. So why has the USDA left out Missouri and
Washington that have had infected human patients?
What happened to the program that was supposed to have started by now
in the states with known infected herds? What will happen with this
current program? Those are the questions that the USDA should be
answering.
Ron Okimoto

It's good see USDA taking an interest in these infections. The CDC
seemed like they weren't paying much attention to the infected birds,
cattle, etc.

Ever get the feeling that our government actually doesn't work?

RonO

2024-12-07 23:42:12 UTC

Post by RonO
https://www.usda.gov/media/press-releases/2024/12/06/usda-
announces- new- federal-order-begins-national-milk-testing
The USDA is finally going to do what needed to be done at the
beginning of the dairy influenza epidemic. They are still calling
it avian influenza when it has been primarily a dairy infection
since March. Things have just gotten to the point where stupidity
and politics can't stop them from doing the right thing any longer.
They are going to start a national milk testing program that will
force the states with infected herds to admit that they have
infected herds and start them doing something about it. They need
to protect dairy workers and poultry flocks from getting infected
by the dairy virus.
The CDC's own research in late October indicated that the dairy
H5N1 genotype B3.13 could survive the most common pasteurization
method and remain infective for at least 4 days in refrigerated
whole milk. The FDA went into denial, but claimed to start another
milk testing program, but implemented the wrong testing protocol to
determine if there was an issue with the milk supply. Instead of
going to plants accepting contaminated milk and testing the raw
milk before pasteurization and then after pasteurization in order
to determine what went in and what came out they asked for
volunteer production facilities and volunteer dairies that wanted
their milk tested. This was obviously stupid, but they did it, and
never have announced any results from the program. They haven't
even claimed that they got enough volunteers to do an effective
study. They probably needed to test up to a hundred plants
handling infected milk, using various procedures to pasteurize
their milk, and they needed to test them multiple times during the
days production, and on multiple different days of the week. They
needed to determine if there was any stage of production that could
be compromized and let infective milk enter the food supply during
stages like shift changes, maintenance, cleaning, and restart.
The Missouri patient and the child that got infected by the dairy
virus in California are possible cases of infection due to
ingestion of dairy products. The CDC claims that they do not know
how the patients were infected, but their only contact with dairy
cattle was the milk that they drank. The milk supply might be 99%
safe, but it is that 1% that could have been an issue in California
and Missouri.
It will be important to know if infective virus is surviving in the
milk supply if the virus does mutate to better infect humans, but
the FDA is not doing what they should be doing. Why would any
regulatory agency rely on volunteers when the ones that will not
volunteer are the most likely to have the issues that they are
looking for?
Ron Okimoto

https://www.tri-cityherald.com/news/business/health-care/
article296704124.html
This Washington State news paper is asking why Washington with 11
infected poultry workers was left off the list for starting bulk
milk tank testing. They aren't the only affected left off the
initial list. a month ago the USDA claimed that they were going to
initiate bulk milk tank testing in states with known infected herds
within 30 days, but that may not have happened. There have been no
updates on that project. I think that they announced that project
around Nov. 7.
The USDA just announced a national program and are planning to start
with Oregon, California, Colorado, Michigan, Mississippi, and
Pennsylvania. Colorado has already done several rounds of bulk milk
tank testing of their dairies since they were infected and
identified the second most number of infected dairies, but are way
behind California in the number of infected herds, mainly because it
looks like they contained the infection by identifying their
infected herds. Oregon, Mississippi, and Pennsylvania have not yet
adimitted to having infected herds. So why has the USDA left out
Missouri and Washington that have had infected human patients?
What happened to the program that was supposed to have started by
now in the states with known infected herds? What will happen with
this current program? Those are the questions that the USDA should
be answering.
Ron Okimoto

It's good see USDA taking an interest in these infections. The CDC
seemed like they weren't paying much attention to the infected birds,
cattle, etc.

Both the CDC and USDA have been pretending that the dairy epidemic
would just go away if they pretended hard enough, but reality is
catching up with them. The CDC already announced a program to start
testing dairy workers a couple weeks ago, but nothing has come of it.
Nothing came of the USDA's first announcement that they were going to
start testing dairies in states with known infections from a month
ago. That attempt may have failed to get started, so they are
claiming that they are going to start this effort. It has been a
fiasco for both the CDC and the USDA from the start in March.
Ron Okimoto

Ever get the feeling that our government actually doesn't work?

https://apnews.com/article/bird-flu-dairy-workers-h5n1-20d6a20ea9e1047ad7a92f9da31709f8

This is an AP news report on the CDC claiming that they were going to
start testing dairy workers back in Nov. 7, but nothing seems to have
happened. The CDC's initial plan was to "monitor" the situation and
wait for the virus to make the jump to infecting humans. They claimed
that they could detect human infections rapidly enough to jump in and
contain the infection when it happened. They haven't even been able to
identify more infected workers in the last 30 days. With responses like
that the next world wide pandemic is pretty much assured to happen if
the virus ever does mutate to infecting humans and becomes a respiratory
infection. They know where the dairy workers are getting infected, and
they can't get testing implemented to identify the infected. How did
they expect to identify the infected so that they could contain the
virus running through the area around the dairies?

https://www.aphis.usda.gov/news/agency-announcements/usda-builds-actions-protect-livestock-public-health-h5n1-avian-influenza

This is the press release where the USDA claimed that they were going to
start testing infected states Oct 30th. It seems nuts that nothing came
of this, and now we have a new national goal that will take how long to
implement?

Ron Okimoto

RonO

2024-12-07 23:52:24 UTC

Post by RonO
https://www.usda.gov/media/press-releases/2024/12/06/usda-
announces- new- federal-order-begins-national-milk-testing
The USDA is finally going to do what needed to be done at the
beginning of the dairy influenza epidemic. They are still calling
it avian influenza when it has been primarily a dairy infection
since March. Things have just gotten to the point where stupidity
and politics can't stop them from doing the right thing any longer.
They are going to start a national milk testing program that will
force the states with infected herds to admit that they have
infected herds and start them doing something about it. They need
to protect dairy workers and poultry flocks from getting infected
by the dairy virus.
The CDC's own research in late October indicated that the dairy
H5N1 genotype B3.13 could survive the most common pasteurization
method and remain infective for at least 4 days in refrigerated
whole milk. The FDA went into denial, but claimed to start another
milk testing program, but implemented the wrong testing protocol
to determine if there was an issue with the milk supply. Instead
of going to plants accepting contaminated milk and testing the raw
milk before pasteurization and then after pasteurization in order
to determine what went in and what came out they asked for
volunteer production facilities and volunteer dairies that wanted
their milk tested. This was obviously stupid, but they did it, and
never have announced any results from the program. They haven't
even claimed that they got enough volunteers to do an effective
study. They probably needed to test up to a hundred plants
handling infected milk, using various procedures to pasteurize
their milk, and they needed to test them multiple times during the
days production, and on multiple different days of the week. They
needed to determine if there was any stage of production that
could be compromized and let infective milk enter the food supply
during stages like shift changes, maintenance, cleaning, and restart.
The Missouri patient and the child that got infected by the dairy
virus in California are possible cases of infection due to
ingestion of dairy products. The CDC claims that they do not know
how the patients were infected, but their only contact with dairy
cattle was the milk that they drank. The milk supply might be 99%
safe, but it is that 1% that could have been an issue in
California and Missouri.
It will be important to know if infective virus is surviving in
the milk supply if the virus does mutate to better infect humans,
but the FDA is not doing what they should be doing. Why would any
regulatory agency rely on volunteers when the ones that will not
volunteer are the most likely to have the issues that they are
looking for?
Ron Okimoto

https://www.tri-cityherald.com/news/business/health-care/
article296704124.html
This Washington State news paper is asking why Washington with 11
infected poultry workers was left off the list for starting bulk
milk tank testing. They aren't the only affected left off the
initial list. a month ago the USDA claimed that they were going to
initiate bulk milk tank testing in states with known infected herds
within 30 days, but that may not have happened. There have been no
updates on that project. I think that they announced that project
around Nov. 7.
The USDA just announced a national program and are planning to
start with Oregon, California, Colorado, Michigan, Mississippi, and
Pennsylvania. Colorado has already done several rounds of bulk
milk tank testing of their dairies since they were infected and
identified the second most number of infected dairies, but are way
behind California in the number of infected herds, mainly because
it looks like they contained the infection by identifying their
infected herds. Oregon, Mississippi, and Pennsylvania have not yet
adimitted to having infected herds. So why has the USDA left out
Missouri and Washington that have had infected human patients?
What happened to the program that was supposed to have started by
now in the states with known infected herds? What will happen with
this current program? Those are the questions that the USDA should
be answering.
Ron Okimoto

It's good see USDA taking an interest in these infections. The CDC
seemed like they weren't paying much attention to the infected
birds, cattle, etc.

Both the CDC and USDA have been pretending that the dairy epidemic
would just go away if they pretended hard enough, but reality is
catching up with them. The CDC already announced a program to start
testing dairy workers a couple weeks ago, but nothing has come of it.
Nothing came of the USDA's first announcement that they were going to
start testing dairies in states with known infections from a month
ago. That attempt may have failed to get started, so they are
claiming that they are going to start this effort. It has been a
fiasco for both the CDC and the USDA from the start in March.
Ron Okimoto

Ever get the feeling that our government actually doesn't work?

https://apnews.com/article/bird-flu-dairy-workers-
h5n1-20d6a20ea9e1047ad7a92f9da31709f8
This is an AP news report on the CDC claiming that they were going to
start testing dairy workers back in Nov. 7, but nothing seems to have
happened. The CDC's initial plan was to "monitor" the situation and
wait for the virus to make the jump to infecting humans. They claimed
that they could detect human infections rapidly enough to jump in and
contain the infection when it happened. They haven't even been able to
identify more infected workers in the last 30 days. With responses like
that the next world wide pandemic is pretty much assured to happen if
the virus ever does mutate to infecting humans and becomes a respiratory
infection. They know where the dairy workers are getting infected, and
they can't get testing implemented to identify the infected. How did
they expect to identify the infected so that they could contain the
virus running through the area around the dairies?
https://www.aphis.usda.gov/news/agency-announcements/usda-builds-
actions-protect-livestock-public-health-h5n1-avian-influenza
This is the press release where the USDA claimed that they were going to
start testing infected states Oct 30th. It seems nuts that nothing came
of this, and now we have a new national goal that will take how long to
implement?
Ron Okimoto

https://abcnews.go.com/Health/usda-issues-order-raw-milk-samples-nationwide-tested/story?id=116531943

Any dairy herds that test positive are required to provide information
that would allow contact tracing in order to track the infection.

QUOTE:
Herd owners with cattle that test positive for bird flu have to provide
information that allows health officials to perform contact tracing and
disease surveillance. Private laboratories and state veterinarians must
now report positive bird flu test results to the USDA.
END QUOTE:

This means that every state will have to do what California did in
finding their infected herds by contact tracing. This is something that
the CDC never implemented. They didn't even try to start contact tracing.

Ron Okimoto

RonO

2024-12-09 20:32:09 UTC