Roxane Feller is the secretary-general of AnimalhealthEurope.
Some 100 million chickens, turkeys, ducks and other birds will likely be unnecessarily culled in the years to come because we aren’t doing enough to control avian flu.
This year alone has already seen unprecedented outbreaks in the United Kingdom, as well as across Europe and the United States, which led to the culling of at least 80 million birds. This is the third such outbreak — each one deadlier than the last — since 40 million birds were lost in 2018, leading to fears of an imminent animal welfare tragedy on an unparalleled scale.
And though wild birds are the primary reservoir for avian flu, there’s still a lot more that can be done to better protect domestic birds and poultry against this virus, through a combination of disease monitoring, biosecurity, and hygiene measures, as well as a safe and proven vaccine.
Today, existing prevention strategies are clearly struggling to overcome the complexities of this evolving and fast-spreading disease. Like the flu in humans, the prevalent strain varies from season to season, and immunity from vaccination can be mistaken for infection, which has damaging implications for the poultry trade, with many countries simply banning poultry meat imports from countries or regions that vaccinate.
But the price of such inaction to animal welfare, poultry production and biodiversity is simply too high to continue paying. Agriculture and public health ministries, veterinary researchers, the animal health industry and farmers must work together to find pragmatic solutions and spare millions of birds from this lethal disease and culling.
Unfortunately, current vaccines aren’t a silver bullet against avian influenza, as shifting strains can alter how effective they are — much like the evolution of COVID-19 variants. However, a combined strategy with surveillance and biosecurity could offer complementary protection, which would better control outbreaks.
For instance, when mandatory poultry vaccination was introduced in China in 2017, with the aim of tackling a strain that could be transmitted to humans, the result was a decrease in prevalence, as well as an end to human cases.
Along these lines, ways of increasing the use of avian flu vaccines around the world was on the agenda at a recent high-level meeting of the International Alliance for Biological Standardization — presented as a more humane alternative than culling when it comes to preventing the spread of disease.
But in addition to the wider use of available vaccines, public health authorities must also maintain investment in research to continue refining and improving inoculations.
While keeping up with evolving strains on the one hand, these new vaccines could also help distinguish vaccinated animals from infected ones. Known as Differentiating Infected from Vaccinated Animals (DIVA) vaccines, such jabs “mark” the antibodies they create in animals, demonstrating to health and regulatory agencies that they originate from vaccination — not disease. This, in turn, provides reassurance, allowing cross-border trade to continue without the fear of importing avian flu.
Supporting further research and development into such tools won’t only help remove barriers relating to trade and evolving disease strains, however. It will also save millions of animal lives.
Lastly, governments must also provide a clear signal to animal health companies that vaccination against bird flu is part of their control strategies, which would incentivize private sector investment.
At present, policies that discourage or rule out vaccination against avian flu to protect poultry exports are limiting investment into research and development for improved vaccines. But taking a clear position that vaccination is one of the many tools we have at our disposal would inspire greater levels of investment, opening the door to even more effective vaccines.
Though it’s true that overcoming these challenges will require significant cooperation at both the international and national levels, removing these barriers and protecting more birds against a preventable disease will have unquestionably positive effects for animal welfare — not to mention biodiversity, human health and food security.
Simply put, by unleashing the full potential of the animal health tools available to us, we can avert another global health crisis that impacts us all — animal and human alike.
