California has declared a state of emergency for bird flu amid fears that the virus could jump to people and start to spread.
It comes just hours after an American in Louisiana was hospitalized with a severe case of the H5N1 bird flu for the first time, and moments before Wisconsin became the ninth state to detect a presumptive bird flu case in a human.
Governor Gavin Newsom declared the emergency today, saying it would free up funds and ‘streamline and expedite’ the state’s efforts to contain the virus.
California has detected the most cases of bird flu in humans and the largest amounts of the virus in its wastewater of any state.
State officials have also detected the virus in 600-odd dairy herds in the state, with half of which having had the infection diagnosed in the past 30 days.
California also declared an emergency over the Covid pandemic, but did not lift this until February 2023.
Newsom said: ‘This proclamation is a targeted action to ensure government agencies have the resources and flexibility they need to respond quickly to this outbreak.
‘Building on California’s testing and monitoring system — the largest in the nation — we are committed to further protecting public health, supporting our agriculture industry [and] ensuring that Californians have access to accurate, up-to-date information.
California has declared a state of emergency over the emerging bird flu pandemic (stock of workers wearing hazmat suits). The above shows workers in tthe Eden Valley, Minnesota, in 2015. They were responding to a bird flu outbreak at a poultry farm
‘While the risk to the public remains low, we will continue to take all necessary steps to prevent the spread of this virus.’
A state of emergency is a formal declaration issued when a significant threat or crisis occurs — such as a natural disaster like flooding, a wildfire or a disease outbreak.
It enables state agencies to use emergency funds and sign contracts with more staff to tackle an emerging threat.
It also gives them the authority to use more state fairgrounds and buildings for their response, and gives the governor emergency powers — which may include the ability to override regulations that are hampering the response.
In 2020 when the Covid emergency was declared, Newsom said that the emergency would allow authorities to access more medical supplies ‘without hurdles’.
California’s governor has signed into law more than 20 state of emergencies this year covering all or part of the state.
Bird flu was first detected in a cattle herd in California in August this year, and has since spread to more than 600 herds in the state.
It has also been diagnosed in 32 patients in the state to date, according to the CDC.
None were hospitalized or died, with officials saying almost all were linked to contact with dairy cattle that were sickened with the virus.
Earlier this month, officials said they were probing an infection in a child over whether they had caught the virus from drinking raw milk.
The above map shows bird flu cases by state in the US that have been recorded this year. The cases are among people
The above shows detections of bird flu in wastewater. There is a cluster of detections in the California area
Overall, bird flu has now been detected in more than 800 cattle herds in 16 states after the first case was detected in the spring.
It has also been detected in 61 people across eight states, who almost all caught the virus after being exposed to infected cattle or wild or domestic poultry.
Washington state has the second highest number of infections at 11 people and Colorado the third highest at 10 people.
The states of Texas, Missouri, Michigan, Oregon, Louisiana and Wisconsin have all detected at least one bird flu case in a human.
There is no evidence that the virus has spread from person-to-person in the US at this point.
Infectious disease experts have repeatedly raised concerns over the infections, warning that each raises the risk of the virus gaining mutations allowing it to spread between people.
California is also one of two states that has conducted recalls of raw milk after these were found to be contaminated with bird flu.
Almost all milk sold in the US goes through pasteurization, where the milk is quickly heated and cooled to kill off any viruses or bacteria that may be lurking in it.
But raw milk does not go through this process, with experts having raised concerns that this could lead to it transmitting bird flu to consumers.
Earlier this month officials were probing a case of a child who was sickened with bird flu in California to establish whether they caught the disease from raw milk.
In the Louisiana case reported today, investigators say the individual who had fallen severely ill likely caught the disease after handling sick and dead birds in a backyard poultry flock.
No further details on their symptoms were released other than they were ‘severely ill’ with the virus.
The patient is currently being treated in a local hospital and it is not thought that they passed on the infection to others.
The CDC said the patient was infected with the D1.1 strain of the virus, which is linked to wild birds and domestic poultry.
It differs from the strain that is currently circulating among cattle.
