Audio file
THIT406 Bird Flu Rough Mix LMK Edits.mp3
Transcript: #43 � Understanding Bird Flu: What to Know for Yourself, Your Flock, and Your Livestock
Maureen Ward
Thank you for joining us for this episode of talking health in the 406 where we are one community under the Big Sky I'm your host Maureen Ward and I work to promote safe and healthy lifestyle choices to help montanans prevent common life altering injuries and illnesses. You may have recently seen or heard the letters. HPA. I in the news that stands for highly pathogenic avian influenza a virus that's been making headlines across the country and right here in Montana. Today we're talking with doctor Paul Ryan a veterinarian and Devin cozart an infectious disease epidemiologist to help unpack what HP AI is how it spreads and why it matters to you whether you raise backyard chickens attend your local County Fair or spend your weekends hunting waterfowl this episode will give you the facts that you need to protect yourself. Your family and your community so stay with us because understanding HP AI isn't just about poultry it's about keeping Montana healthy from the backyard to the Backcountry. 3. Well hello thank you for being here today we're excited to talk today about the highly pathogenic avian influenza or the HP AI I know it's been all over the news. And so today we have with us doctor Paul Ryan and Devin cozart to tell us a little bit more about the avian flu and what montanans need to know so we'll go ahead and start with if each of you could just do a brief introduction and tell us your role with avian flu.
Devin Cozart
Hi my name is Devin Cozart and I am the zoonotic and vector borne disease epidemiologist with the state of Montana so essentially my role with avian flu and HP I is some of the the human monitoring aspects so we're the ones who are keeping tabs on cases and animals and making sure we don't have transmission to humans which is my primary role as well as information. Contribution so and when responsible for putting out press releases as well as writing what we call Hans which are alerts that we send to our medical providers in the state if we have a major event that happens where we feel like our providers need to know what's going on so they can manage their patients.
Dr. Benjamin Ryan (Paul Ryan)
I'm Paul Ryan I'm a veterinarian have been for nearly 10 years now generally where your veterinarians fit in to responding to any kind of avian influenza is noticing and seeing potentially the first outbreak of sick birds where that might transfer over from. Wild birds into. You a population. Of a home. Flock for instance that people might call their family veterinarian and just say hey something 's not quite right and I am at DPHS now as well working on completing my masters in public health.
Maureen Ward
Great well let's start with what is highly pathogenic avian avian influenza it's so hard to even say and how is it different from the seasonal flu or other forms of bird flu that we might have heard about.
Devin Cozart
So it's actually very similar in a way but also very different compared to seasonal flu and it is worth noting this is a flu virus much like our seasonal flu we say oh I have a flu it is the same virus essentially but what differentiates it is that it does not circulate seasonally in humans so actually the. Ours is that we understand as a seasonal flu. Started out at 1:00 point not being a seasonal flu they started out as pandemics and became seasonal in humans so that's one of the big differences so we have our our seasonal foods are familiar with and now we have what we call HP AI or highly pathogenic avian influenza and what this details is that this is an. Avian blue meaning like a like a bird so it's a a type of flu virus that primarily transmits between. Words blue viruses affect all sorts of different animals birds dogs horses bats so it's it's a very adaptable virus it's very interesting virus and the highly pathogenic comes into play. Which I think is can be a little bit confusing for people when they first hear it how pathogenic avian flu refers to how the virus acts and domestic poultry? So highly pathogenic means that it heavily impacts causes high mortality high death rates in domestic flocks so that's where the high pathogenic comes into play again referring only to the impact on poultry not on humans there's also a classification of these viruses called low pathogenic avian influenza which doesn't cause us high mortality in birds. But sometimes can also infect humans and doesn't necessarily coordinate with how severe infection in a human might. Be so let's.
Maureen Ward
Talk a little bit about the disease itself and you know we live in Montana so how long has it been circulating here and how. Did it get here?
Dr. Benjamin Ryan (Paul Ryan)
It first showed. Up in Montana in 2022 and. It's a disease that's spread by wild birds it doesn't cause a very big reaction in many of the wild birds there's a few species that are a little bit more sensitive to it so occasionally like the fish wildlife and Parks Department of fish wildlife parks here in Montana. They respond to. Sick birds or dead birds somebody will call in and let them know that there's some dead birds or a number of. Dead. Birds in a certain area and they can go collect that and that's where they can track that for. Veterinarian domestic flocks of birds usually we see them you'll see a lot of sick birds pop up or a lot of dead birds all of a sudden as Devin mentioned it can get into a poultry barn or somebody 's flock and. You can lose a number a good number of your birds overnight it can act that quickly so that's generally where we see it crossing over is from the wild birds into our domestic birds and that's when oftentimes that's the first time that people producers families. We notice that the disease is spread. OK.
Maureen Ward
No I didn't know it acted that quickly I myself have a backyard flock of chickens here in Helena and we'll have to keep a lookout over the summer yes so I know that in the news we have seen some snippets here and there of you know there has been some human transmission and some other animals. Besides birds so can you talk a little bit about it being found in other mammals and then what is that likelihood of it you know jumping to humans and how concerned should montanans be.
Dr. Benjamin Ryan (Paul Ryan)
Bottom line up front I think it's important to say that it's very very low risk for people to catch this especially the general public there have been a number of cases where people have become infected from both exposure to sick birds in a poultry barn and as well as. Sick cows that is another place where it's spreading in animals other than birds and those people are generally ones that were in a highly exposed environment and they worked with those animals. Throughout the course of their work day and they may not have had access or even known that the animals were sick so they weren't protecting themselves appropriately so the risk to the general public is very low. The reason why many veterinarians are very concerned is that because it can spread so rapidly and make huge numbers of birds very ill very. Quickly that it can really cause problems for egg producers or poultry barns that produce meat it can wipe out their entire operation in a matter of days if we're not keeping track of that and it could spread rapidly from one producer to the other in a relatively. This first geographic area so we treat this very seriously as veterinarians.
Maureen Ward
How does it spread from animal to animal you know is it airborne do they have to ingest bodily fluids or you know does it travel in poop like how how do the birds spread it amongst themselves?
Dr. Benjamin Ryan (Paul Ryan)
Uh there's a lot of ways that it can spread for sure it can be spread in. Just about any discharge so like respiratory droplets that might happen if a bird sneezes that's a something that you might not recognize is bird sneezing but they do and that can spread droplets. Of saliva that can carry the virus definitely can be shed in bird droppings so it's you know one more reason to make sure you wash your hands anytime you're handling birds or cleaning up after cleaning up outside just making sure you're protecting yourself. And it will play into a lot of biosecurity measures that we need that we'll talk about here in a bit so dev and I think you've probably got a good good things to add to this as well.
Devin Cozart
Those are the primary methods we see with like animal to animal transmission you know we're really worried about feces contamination some droplet spread as well so we refer to that kind of like as a director and direct contact with the birds when it goes from bird to bird so one big thing to watch out for for example again we'll talk about this more we get the biosecurity. It would be waterfowl on the primary carrier so do you have waterfowl poop in areas where your domestic flocks are also hanging out is the big question to ask yourself so that's going to be a lot of the spread that we're concerned with in addition sometimes with other mammals what we saw early on with the hpai. Spread throughout the US we started seeing some other mammals get sick and. That was initially linked to carnivores and scavengers. Like if you look at the amount of mammals and the type of mammals we had getting sick we were looking at raccoons foxes bears mountain lions really animals we associated with with meat eaters or scavengers. And that's we think because they were consuming the bird carcasses themselves and and that's why they were likely getting sick with hpai that's changed a little bit since the start but that's still the leading thought for why we were seeing that that early infection in carnivores.
Maureen Ward
How does HP AI affect poultry farmers egg production and the wild bird populations here in Montana so far?
Dr. Benjamin Ryan (Paul Ryan)
This is something that uh is highly variable so far we've been really effective at.
Speaker
On.
Dr. Benjamin Ryan (Paul Ryan)
Dressing when there have been outbreaks and the outbreaks have generally been small and not spread much beyond the initial at all. Beyond their the place where it was first recognized so the measures that the Montana department of livestock the state veterinarian and the USDA are taking are working very well to help prevent that from spreading further than you know a small home flock that might be affected or an individual producer of either. Eggs or uh meat uh they're doing a really good job of shutting that down and making sure that it doesn't start spreading. Within a community.
Maureen Ward
Yeah Speaking of those backyard flocks it's what should people who do have chickens at home do to help protect their flocks and if they do suspect I mean obviously it would be pretty obvious probably if they're walk out and unfortunately many or all of their chickens have just have died overnight. Uh what do they do you know how do they report that.
Dr. Benjamin Ryan (Paul Ryan)
Call your veterinarian as soon as you notice that your animals are unwell and this can be when we're talking about the different ways that HP I can show up in your home flock it can be less severe but it can also be all the way up to that very serious end where you walk into your coop in the morning and there's multiple birds that have passed away overnight. Some of the things that you might see in your birds on the very low end perhaps the very first signs and symptoms that you might see. Is that your birds might just be kind of ruffled they'll be quiet and ruffled their feathers will be fluffed they'll just not look very energetic they won't have the same energy that they normally do those are kind of some things that you should might be cluing you into maybe I should call my veterinarian and? Uh let him know what's going on and they can come out and see what's going on some other things that we can see would be swelling of the wattle those soft kind of tissue. Portions around their beak and on their faces that can be swollen it can change colors to. Like a blue. Or a purple or darken and that can happen the same on their feet so anywhere where you can see the skin you can keep a close eye on that and see if there's some color changes or if there seems to be swelling those would be signs that I would be. Getting a little bit excited and I'd want to call my veterinarian as soon as possible and see if they could come take care and see what's going on.
Maureen Ward
And is there anything they can do to help protect their home flocks.
Dr. Benjamin Ryan (Paul Ryan)
Uh there is and when we talk about the term of biosecurity it sounds like this big complicated scary thing and it certainly can be for somebody that's like a commercial. Flock razer egg producer meat producer that's a very big part of what they do and they invest a lot of money in it but for most home family coops there's a number of small things that you can do that you know may decrease the risk that you're birds are at substantially in just protecting them from. Uh. Coming in contact with some of the materials that could cause them to be. Ill. So the first thing that we can do is there's a ton of really good resources out there the USDA has an entire program called protect the flock and it's has a ton of really good resources that if you're curious and interested. You can search for USDA protect the flock and it's linked through the Centers for Disease control the CDC as well but what that boils down to is like Devin mentioned this is a disease that's passed through from wild birds contacting your birds in some way whether that's through. Pooping in areas where your birds are also have access to. Whether they might be able to come in direct contact with them particularly birds like waterfowl those are big. Risk factors and there's a couple of things you can do if you have a small coupe is keeping your chickens and birds kind of collected up to some extent as much as possible and then putting potentially like bird netting over the top of the the coop area that should stop direct contact in most cases as long as it's well maintained. Of wild birds getting into your coop area and potentially eating food that might have been left out in the and in the yard area that your birds also have access to now it it doesn't prevent wild birds from flying over and dropping poop into that yard. But it does decrease a lot of the direct risk Devin does there are some other things that you can think of off the top of your head that might be helpful.
Devin Cozart
I think one of the big things to point out too is this is especially important to consider if you know you're in an area that's prone to water. Oh so if you have a lake on your property if you know that you're underneath the flyway at certain times of the year will waterfowl migrate. Make sure especially if you're if we're in waterfowl season where we're going to have birds passing over that you're taking some extra measures during those times a year especially right now when we know we have HP I circulating and it's a risk to your flock so I think that's a big thing to consider is just timeliness knowing where you are a migratory patterns and if you do have any shared water sources. Uh controlling that as best as possible and again USDA and there are different bot program has some great resources on how to do.
Maureen Ward
That you mentioned the USDA and so I'd like to talk a little bit more about that what are agencies like the USDA or the CDC doing in coordination with agencies around the state. To help address hpai both on a national level and also here in.
Devin Cozart
Tina this is a great example of what we've come to call one health approach right so when we say one health we mean that we have animal Health and Human health partners working closely together to benefit the health of humans and animals at the same time rather than trying to operate as separate entities because really we're all connected right so we have this very strong. Health approach USDA is working with the CDC. USDA is working with the FDA USDA is is helping UM on a state level and federal level as well which is very important to work out they're all working with fishbaugh and parks and all of them are working with state and local health offices so everybody is working together here and everybody is involved so a lot of this. That involves reporting right so on the human health side of things over here like where I work for the Montana Department of Health. I would not necessarily know that we have an affected bird flock unless I am told because that's not something that we normally monitor since we are human health focused So what how that usually works is our partners over at the department of livestock reaches out to us when we have a a bird fault that's positive and alerts us to that positive. That way on the human health side we can step in and start talking to the flock owners and let them know what they're at risk for let them give them a little more information about HP. Guy and umm and make sure they're not developing any symptoms of hpai so we can make sure that we're reducing the chances of of transmission to humans and making sure that it's not actually going from the birds to the humans in the first place so there's a lot of coordinated efforts here this includes with with parks as well so with wild mammals and birds. It works the same way we're notified and then we step in and handle the human health side of things while they manage the animal health side So what to do with the infected bird flocks or how to test a Mountain Lion if they think a Mountain Lion might have HP I.
Maureen Ward
And of course you know I think of diseases like influenza and we do have some protective measures for sort of the normal strains of flu are there any vaccines or treatments available or being explored for HP I.
Devin Cozart
That's a great question and it varies a little bit with which we're talking about so in terms of treatments yes we are very lucky. That the flu antivirals that we already use for our seasonal flus will still work on hpai so let's say that you have contact with your your backyard block ends up. Positive after that positive is detected we can go ahead and get you started on antivirals again that's going through your your primary care provider I'm not going to prescribe that directly but I can recommend that you talk to your primary and get some. Antivirus started if. You would like them so that's a really early way we have of managing our exposures to hpai and making sure that we're not getting sick. And we're lucky that we already have these antivirus available and then mass quantities and ready to go because we're used to using them during the flu season. On the vaccine note that's a little bit different our flu vaccines are made-up of types of flu viruses that are seasonal flus right and that's what it's supposed to protect.
Speaker
That's.
Devin Cozart
We do not currently believe that's going to provide any cross protection with hpai and the reason for that could really comes down to again the type of food that we're looking at HPI and seasonal flu are both the type of flu a so both within that same family of flu viruses. Break that down smaller and our seasonal flu is currently are referred to as H 3 N 2 and H one. In one our H one N one haven't derived from our oh 9 swine flu pandemic if anybody recalls that in contrast the current HP I we have circulating is called H 5 N one the difference is in those 2 we have NH 3 and an H one versus an H 5 means that there is not a lot of cross protection because it's just 2 different of a flu virus unfortunately. And because of that what we do instead have developing is what the CDC. Does when they are tracking this virus is they have and are preparing based off the genetics of the virus that's currently circulating that's H 5 N one HP I they have a Kennet vaccine virus related to go so they are tracking this virus they are keeping track of any genetic changes and they have a candidate vaccine virus? Ready in case this stuff start going from human to human and spreading really easily humans so while there is not one currently it will not take us very long to get one world out if we needed.
Maureen Ward
It so it seems like the message is right now the transmission to humans is pretty low and we're not seeing a lot of human to human transmission at this point is that correct.
Devin Cozart
That's right. So currently we still are saying and we still believe that the rest of the humans is very low especially to the general population again if you're just. Walking to work you're living your normal life don't have enough exposure to animals that kind of thing you were at essentially no risk currently of hpai. We see some populations with a slightly elevated risk and that's going to be our backyard flock owners who have contact with sick birds and again as we've mentioned we are not talking about your flock is mostly healthy but acting a little bit off or maybe you had one bird out of 50 die we're not talking about that we're talking about mass death within birds and. In some cases confirm HPI exposure so we're worried about those individuals people who collect and harvest waterfowl who hunt waterfowl. A veterinarians who possibly have exposure to hpai through other livestock other livestock owners such as dairy cattle owners alpacas that kind of thing or people who handle raw milk all those are going to be our elevated risk factors and more but those those are kind of our main categories again that's just a slightly elevated risk we're really not seeing. I am a high impact in humans currently or a very good adaptation of the H 5 N one virus to humans so it still doesn't like us very much which is great and as a result of that we're still not seeing human to human transmission in this type of H 5 N one but I'd like to warn that doesn't mean it's impossible and that's part of the balance. Here we've seen what we refer to as non sustained human to human transmission of previous types of H 5 N one viruses so what's happening in the US right now is not the first time we've seen H 5 N one there's been previous outbreaks in other countries around the world. And when we've seen that there's been just a handful of documented cases where someone who was very sick. Who may not have access to health care or does not seek healthcare as being intended to primarily by a family member during their illness and that family member develops HP AI infection? And then it stops there it does not go any further than that one. Family member. And that's been in the just a handful of documented cases so it does happen but it's still extremely poorly adapted and we haven't seen that happen at all with the current type of H 5 N one circulating in birds and other animals in. The United states.
Dr. Benjamin Ryan (Paul Ryan)
Yeah and I can add on to that maybe some context on the animal health side of the house too there are. Some vaccines that are currently in process for animals particularly the most cases that we have seen spread from animals to people have come from dairy cows and from chickens and and currently there are vaccines available for each respective. Species but they haven't been approved for license for use by producers at this point preliminary studies have shown that they're effective in decreasing the amount of virus that might be produced or.
Speaker
Yeah.
Dr. Benjamin Ryan (Paul Ryan)
When you get sick your the virus produces billions and trillions of itself inside of you and generally with these vaccines we've seen that number vastly decrease the important thing there is that even though the animals get sick they're not producing the levels of virus that could potentially jump over into people and that's a huge protective factor? You know and that's something that's being looked at very closely right now because that would be one of the ways that we could really. Significantly decrease the risk of getting ill with HP I AI even for those people that have to live and work within very close. Proximity of animals that could get ill so this is something that's interesting to keep an eye on in the future but there's no current. Estimation of when those may become available or go into general use.
Maureen Ward
As far as our hunters go what sort of recommendations guidelines do you have for our especially our waterfowl hunters. As to how they can also protect themselves as you know they're out hunting waterfowl cleaning waterfowl and the things that they need to be thinking about this season.
Devin Cozart
One big note being that waterfowl won't always show since those of hpai so unlike when we're talking about other animals in some cases with waterfowl we're not talking about an obviously sick bird in all cases sometimes they can show symptoms and be physically sick but sometimes they won't so that's really important to note especially when you're hunting and handling. Heart valves that they may not show any. Obvious signs of illness. So what we typically recommend and what we recommend anyways when when hunting or harvesting anything is PPE while we're doing that so that's gonna include like gloves because we mentioned before they can have if they have saliva like on their feathers where they like you know ruffled their feathers with their beak and that kind of thing that can have virus in it. As well as anytime you're handling feces not to mention tissue and and and animal organs and that kind of thing so gloves always big especially you know monitor the status of your hands and make sure you don't have any open wounds on your. Hands while you're. Handling these things. Like that's always a bad. Idea because that's a really great entry point for. Hpai as well as many other types of illnesses. Additionally we do tend to recommend like a face mask because as you're processing an animal you can essentially kind of sputter liquid around so face mask and and goggles are always great as well as once you get home taking off those clothes and immediately throwing them into the wash and dryer because especially with avian flu. You and if you have a backyard flock what we can see is that the clothes that you wear when you're touching waterfowl or in their environment that you then bring home to your animals to your family will still have viable virus on it that can spread so that is another way of of bringing infection essentially back home to to your animals or or to your family members. Umm so again take off those clothes go ahead and toss them in the washer and get those clean is is another great thing to do.
Speaker
To. OK.
Dr. Benjamin Ryan (Paul Ryan)
And then for consuming wild game it's important to make sure that you cook things to an appropriate temperature the virus is not viable once it's been cooked it cannot as long as what you've even if it's a. Duck that was ill with HP AI and. Didn't look ill you did appropriate procedures to protect yourself during the cleaning process and the processing as long as you cook that bird to the full temperature that's recommended by the USDA that will be safe to consume for you and your family. As a veterinarian I will say this is I know it can be tempting sometimes to share some of the the juicy bits with your. Yeah your dog or your potentially your cat when you're processing withhold from that please because they can be protected as well by cooking that bird fully if you want to share something with your pets just make sure that what they're eating is fully cooked as well that's important to protect them.
Maureen Ward
Well it's almost summer in Montana and we are coming up on County Fair season so. So I know my kids are in 4 H we don't do the animal stuff but they do love to walk through the barns and see all the animals including chickens and cows is there anything for those you know for those fair goers or for the folks who are bringing animals to the fair that we need to know to stay safe.
Dr. Benjamin Ryan (Paul Ryan)
I think the biggest thing is just communicating with your veterinarian ahead of time and letting them know that you're going to if you're one of those families that's bringing your animals to the fair. This is something that's being tracked and veterinarians are aware that we're getting into the fair season at the animals will be traveling around the state at higher rates than they do at other times of the year and we'll have some your veterinarian will have the best recommendation for how to protect yourselves and your animals that might be going to the flock. If your families that just don't participate in 4 H but you do like to go through those barns and just see all of the animals and the hard work that a lot of our families been putting in? The state that's wonderful and good just make sure we kind of follow the same recommendations as if you're hunting is too before you might go home and interact with your own birds or your own animals just change out of those clothes. And get them in the wash make sure that they can't access that and then the other thing that you can do too is just. Fares will be putting up hand washing stations hand sanitization stations. Please do follow any instructions that might be posted in those uh animal where they're in those barns and areas where they're keeping all the animals just follow the instructions really carefully because those have. Then those instructions have been developed with a lot of care and thought about how to protect the animals that are there as well as animals across the state that may be at people 's homes and just from visiting families so there is a method to the madness there's a lot of things going on so just to keep it. Don't mind please thank you.
Devin Cozart
Yeah I can I can add on a little bit to that as well agricultural fairs are we're not only concerned about like HP I they're right that's going to be a bigger concern well we know we have it circulating yes but in general there's something that. But occasional results from contact at agricultural fairs that we refer to as a flu variant which means a a new type of flu can pop up at agricultural fairs and these may be mild cases and they may be severe it really just depends on the virus itself and how you react to it so again you proper hand washing. Is is great at agricultural affairs especially if you're gonna go enjoy a snack afterwards you know make sure you're washing your hands before you put that hand in your mouth or in your eyes or if you don't have access to soap and water regularly which does happen at ag fairs remember to at least have some hand sanitizer I'm at ready which which will help? And that also comes into play with some GI based illnesses such as salmonella which can happen by a contact at agricultural affairs so hand washing is is great we're always here to promote some good old fashioned water and soap on the hands.
Maureen Ward
Are there any myths out there that you've heard that you would want to dispel about avian flu?
Devin Cozart
I think a big one that I see quite often UM your chickens at least or your backyard turkeys you know whatever clock you have in the back are not going to have HP AI specifically and not show symptoms that's a big measure for avian flu. So there's nothing that's gonna cause sporadic illness in you while your birds are still healthy and again we're not seeing human to human transmission so this is not something that's currently transmitting in the community. So any fear around that we are not currently about worry about that type of transmission our frontline people right now are going to be people who have hands on contact with infected animals especially dairy cattle and positive poultry and and that's really where a lot of our attention and our prevention measures need to be right now.
Dr. Benjamin Ryan (Paul Ryan)
And I think something important to keep in mind too is that really the only 2 species that we have identified as being a risk for the avian influenza to spread from cows and chickens those are the only 2 species that we've identified really that and lead to human infection. Many other species of animals can become infected and it can be quite serious for them so we recommend that you you know always have your animals seen as a veterinarian but it's not a a major risk for you should your house cat become ill with avian influenza. You know we'll still recommend that you try and clean up as much as possible and be sanitary at home if your cat is found to have avian influenza but don't don't panic is the big thing that we want to carry over with. Pretty much any animal exposure outside of chickens and cows you know we don't panic even with the chickens and cows but there's even less of a risk with any other animal that you might come in contact with just practicing good hand washing technique is really the best thing that you can do and will. In most cases likely be very. Question.
Devin Cozart
I couldn't elaborate a little bit more too on some of the the food safety side of things because I I know there was quite a bit of alarm caused early on when we first started detecting HPI and cattle and refer to an investigation that showed a positive milk samples in commercial dairy products so like the milk you'll get at the grocery store that is not. A worry any commercially available dairy or poultry products are not a concern right now the reason the reason for that messaging that was distributed was because it is possible for some. Milk that was previously contaminated with a type of hpai to still test positive after it has been pasteurized and that's because there's tiny little essentially pieces like fragments of that virus still left they are not dangerous they are not viable meaning they cannot cause any sort of infection and it it. We will not make you sick body will not recognize it but it it can still test positive on some types of tests that can detect fragments that small of a virus we know full and well pasteurization does kill this virus pasteurization is essentially a super heating and then cooling of a. That and the flu virus cannot survive that so even if before it was pasteurized milk was contaminated it would survive that process so there's no concern for commercial dairy production at this time very similar kind of concept with poultry birds that are stick with HPI again that's a very dramatic event when birds are sick. Are not used in human food products if HP is suspected or detected and in theory if we did have contaminated meat as soon? As that's cooked. We are not concerned anymore it would kill the virus so again you know while you're handling poetry to be extra safe make sure you're washing your hands after handling like a chicken breast for the evening for for dinner any sort of poultry products we wanna make sure that we're still practicing good hand hygiene for a lot of reasons on that so wash your hands after handling it and make sure it's cooked to a safe temperature.
Maureen Ward
Well and I hope everyone is anyway because you know exactly yeah is there anything else I'm missing any other takeaways that you want to make sure montanans know about HP AI as we head into the summer months and then of course into the fall. I. The other thing.
Devin Cozart
A big take away that I really have with each Pi and the dangerousness but also the not the dangerousness of it right how it's both a threat and not a threat at the same time it can make messaging very difficult on on this type of disease but the the take away with that is.
Speaker
This.
Devin Cozart
The more contact we have with HP AI the more likely it is to become a. Problem. So what we want to do is avoid contact where possible for people who can with obviously sick backyard flocks with waterfowl with sick dairy cattle and if we do have to be around. Umm. Any animals like that that we are wearing PPE because the more often we have contact with this virus the more likely it is to adapt to humans and that's where we have a problem once we see human human transmission we're in a place we don't want to be with this virus we've had influenza pandemics throughout human history and no one 's ready for another pandemic? So my big take away is that it kind of comes down to you at this point right the more that we do not interact with the virus and the more distance we have between us and it the less likely it is to become a problem.
Dr. Benjamin Ryan (Paul Ryan)
Yep that's huge and then I think maybe just recognizing what times of the year because it is still seasonal to some extent just recognizing what times of the year we need to be extra vigilant around our contact with birds and the spring and fall migrations. A huge one because that's when we see a lot of those wild birds. Moving through our area particularly the waterfowl that could be spreading that 2 hour domestic flocks as well as coming into fair season and the any movement of animals is always something that can increase the risk for exposure to things. You know coming back to what Devin says we're really just trying to minimize the exposure of what's going on so. For folks in the rodeo world that's a big thing you've all heard about a number of diseases that veterinarians are concerned about crossing state borders this is very much the same thing so the more that we can do ahead of time to prevent these diseases spreading regularly. The less trouble we will have trying to keep track of that down the road so just keep up. And. Have a conversation with your veterinarian anytime you're moving traveling with your animals and that will generally make a big impact on the overall risk to everybody in Montana and across the United states?
Maureen Ward
Is there anywhere where you would recommend people to seek out information on whether or not transmission rates are going up or down or anything if they want to keep an eye on this as we go through the summer and fall where is the best place that they should look?
Devin Cozart
The CDC actually has a great summary webpage what's happening with hpai right now and I think that is a great resource if you just wanna know is there any more risk are we seeing more human cases I just want a snapshot and visual of what's going on the CDC 's current situation summary and if you just type. In that to. Google. CDC HPI current situation it will be the first thing that comes up and they have a little map of where we've had cases they they have what those cases are associated with so like we have so many cases in California associated with dairy call exposure. They have that all ready to go on their website as well as information about the current risks of the general public so that is just a great catch all page in terms of human health risk that you can find very easily and and very reliable they immediately update information on that web page as soon as we have new cases.
Dr. Benjamin Ryan (Paul Ryan)
And this is something that we can link in the footnotes of this.
Speaker
Yes.
Devin Cozart
I think another big web page because a lot of questions that I get even working with Department of Health is we'll have we seen any positive animals in this state or what have you seen positive animals and there's 2 different major resources for that one catch all for this information nationally is gonna be the USDA again so USDA HPI detections. And they have a broken up for the whole country based off mammals wild birds domestic birds and. Livestock are other livestock. So you can see where there have been recent detections and the around the country so if you went to that and typed in Montana you would see that when our last detections were throughout the states in addition our department of livestock has their own web page about where we've had positive flux in the states so you can see again when our last positive flock. Was detected where it was and what our timeline looks like in terms of like well when was our highest amount of cases how did we look in March of last year so they have their own maps on the web page showing all that? Then.
Dr. Benjamin Ryan (Paul Ryan)
This is something that is not just being monitored by the US but also by Canada Mexico and a lot of countries in South America the whole world 's keeping an eye on this so it is something that is under a lot of vigilance right now and there's a lot of really. Smart people keeping an eye on all aspects of it particularly through the one health lens to make sure that we are doing everything possible to make sure that this doesn't become a big issue as Devin mentioned and become a human health issue and pass just an animal health issue.
Devin Cozart
One more point here that I think is worth referencing and that. It can be a little bit difficult to discuss but I do want to briefly mention the human flu vaccine and you might remember that I already said that it's not protected against hpai right but if you're somebody who has constant contact with dairy cattle that might be infected or domestic poultry that might be infected. Uh we highly encourage that you get your your seasonal flu vaccine and the reason for that is actually because I'm I've also mentioned how the more contact we have with this virus the more likely it is just be able. To spread and affect. Humans what makes that situation all the more likely is if you. Have? Human seasonal. Flu. And you decide it doesn't matter that I'm sick right now because my cows need to be fed you know that that is a priority for you however if we start having contact between human flus and HP I those 2 flu viruses can actually combine. Right so we want to avoid that wherever possible the less likely you are to be sick with seasonal human flu the less likely we we are to see the HIV virus mutate in a way that is going to be dangerous. To. Us because we don't want those 2 flu viruses meeting together.
Dr. Benjamin Ryan (Paul Ryan)
I'll echo on Devon there that's one of the most common ways that we see a rapid shift in flu viruses because they kind of fit together like puzzle pieces I guess is the. Best way to. Put it and when you have when you've mixed together 2 different puzzle boxes into the same. Person or pig or you know some other farm animal take your pick and they have 2 different influenza viruses at the same time. The risk is is that those puzzle pieces will get jumbled and then suddenly the part of the puzzle piece that makes it really be able to spread between chickens or people gets put onto something that was originally in a pig and then it that's how we can see a rapid shift. That can be very very trouble. Awesome for us as people.
Maureen Ward
Well thank you both for joining us today I appreciate your time and hopefully we can have a great summer and fall here in Montana and keep HP I out of the human population as much as possible so thank you for all of your great knowledge.
Devin Cozart
Thank you thank you so much I'm happy.
Maureen Ward
To be here thanks for listening to talking health on the 406 where we are. One community under the Big Sky I'm your host Maureen Ward. A big thank you to our guests today doctor Paul Ryan and Devin cozart for the sharing their expertise if you'd like to learn more about highly pathogenic avian influenza or any of the topics we covered please visit talking health in the406.mt.gov if you found this episode helpful please rate review and subscribe. It helps us reach more montanans like you until next time take care of yourselves your neighbors and your flocks and stay healthy Montana.