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Officials have collected feedback from states and industry on a bird flu vaccination strategy document – part of an administration effort to weigh its benefits and pitfalls. The probe comes as one of the longstanding barriers to vaccination may be fading.
A month after entering office, the Trump administration unveiled its strategy to combat highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI), or bird flu. The five-pronged, $1 billion approach included an effort to gather feedback and develop a pathway for vaccinating flocks.
Late last year, officials sent a draft document outlining the framework to state veterinarians and then to agriculture commissioners for feedback. Some industry groups were also invited to weigh in, with a deadline for comments earlier this month, according to a person familiar with the situation.
A USDA spokesperson tells Agri-Pulse the administration is now “considering the feedback.” The spokesperson did not provide a timeline for when the framework would be completed, saying only that “strategies are still being developed and refined.”
The U.S. has not yet authorized HPAI vaccinations in commercial flocks, only allowing administration in certain endangered or zoo species, the spokesperson stressed, but added that USDA is evaluating “additional potential tools in the fight against HPAI, including possible vaccination strategies.”
“They're trying to be very careful not to call it a vaccination plan,” Jim Watson, a state veterinarian on the Mississippi Board of Animal Health, told Agri-Pulse in a December interview, noting that the draft document is only for a proposed strategy. Importantly, he said the strategy does not commit the administration to vaccinating, but outlines an approach that could be implemented, should officials decide to roll out vaccinations in the future.
Yet two people who have seen the initial draft document say it is comprehensive, outlining approaches to surveillance, epidemiological work and working with trade partners to minimize disruptions.
Representatives from the egg and poultry industry told Agri-Pulse that they mostly approved of the administration’s proposed strategy. There were some lingering questions around what costs might fall on the industry versus the government, according to one egg industry source.
But one longstanding barrier to vaccinations will still need to be addressed to secure industry backing for any vaccination effort: import restrictions from U.S. trading partners.
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If other countries could assure U.S. officials that vaccination efforts won’t lead to widespread trade restrictions, it could eliminate the most significant obstacle for any vaccination program. And global attitudes on this front could be shifting.
France’s warning
The French poultry sector serves as a cautionary tale for countries contemplating vaccinating flocks against HPAI. In 2023, France was the first European Union country to mount a mandatory, nationwide HPAI vaccination program, which focused on commercial duck flocks.
Almost immediately several trading partners – including the U.S., Japan, Canada and the United Kingdom – restricted French poultry product imports over concerns that vaccinations could make the disease harder to detect and leave their domestic flocks vulnerable to transmission.
The restrictions were lifted once countries had evaluated the vaccination practices and the impacts on transmission, but only after several years of disrupted exports.
Accordingly, the U.S. broiler industry has long opposed any effort to vaccinate domestic flocks out of fear their exports could be dented.
“There’s a tremendous amount at stake here,” Tom Super, senior vice president of public affairs at the National Chicken Council, said in an email. U.S. broiler industry exports are worth more than $4 billion a year, he noted, with exports going to 125 countries.
Until the industry receives assurances that those exports won’t face disruptions, Super added, “we will continue to oppose vaccination for HPAI for any species.”
The Mexican and Canadian markets are of particular concern, Greg Tyler, president and CEO of the USA Poultry and Egg Export Council (USA PEEC), told Agri-Pulse in an interview this week. Mexico was the largest recipient of U.S. poultry products in 2024, importing almost $1.5 billion, according to USDA data. Canada was the second-largest export destination with around $530 million worth of purchases.
Greg Tyler (USAPEEC photo)The U.S. layer and turkey industries have been more supportive of vaccinating. But Tyler notes that if officials “can ensure that that trade is going to continue, then I think you're going to find more support across all sectors of the industry.”
The Canadian and Mexican embassies in Washington did not respond to requests to contribute to this story.
Thawing attitudes
Even if countries aren’t ready to publicly pledge to avoid restricting U.S. poultry over vaccinations, industry participants are noting a shift in global attitudes to HPAI vaccination.
One egg industry representative granted anonymity to speak about private discussions told Agri-Pulse that foreign officials are taking a particular interest in U.S. movements.
“They say, ‘Where are you guys on a vaccine? Because we’d really like to use it as well,’” the source said. “There's a lot of the world that's waiting for the U.S. to jump.”
Part of the shift, the industry representative noted, is driven by a resurgence of the virus in places like Japan, the United Kingdom and the EU.
Several countries are now looking more seriously at vaccinations to protect their domestic industries. The Netherlands launched a two-year HPAI vaccination pilot in its layer industry last year. The UK government is also planning to begin its own pilot program for turkeys in the spring. Several other countries are also running their own pilot programs.
David Swayne, a former USDA poultry researcher who now offers consulting to the private sector on bird flu and disease issues, said that there is an increasing global appetite for targeted vaccination in which countries vaccinate only the birds that are the most susceptible to the disease.
David Swayne (LinkedIn photo)International organizations are also fostering a more tolerant view of vaccinations, Swayne said.
Last February, the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization and the World Organization for Animal Health issued their updated ten-year strategy for tackling HPAI. The 42-page document calls for, among other things, the promotion of vaccines to minimize the spread from wild to domestic animals.
The report also noted the proliferation of misinformation around HPAI vaccination and encouraged countries to correct misconceptions as they resolve trade barriers arising from vaccination programs.
“Those two global organizations really took a step forward in saying we really need to be using more vaccination as a tool,” Swayne said. “That has pressed down to the national level of multiple countries around the globe.”
Working with allies
Underpinning any successful U.S. vaccination effort will be the Trump administration’s ability to work with trading partners to protect market access. USDA Undersecretary for Trade and Foreign Agricultural Affairs Luke Lindberg told Agri-Pulse recently that the topic of vaccination has already come up in some of his conversations with U.S. trading partners.
But some worry that President Donald Trump’s use of trade policy to cudgel countries into advancing U.S. policy objectives on everything from Greenland to immigration and drug policy may not foster the collaborative relationships required to preserve U.S. poultry exports amid a vaccination campaign.
Further, the administration has been challenging vaccine science in other public health arenas – suggesting it may not be inclined to mount the kind of communications campaign dedicated to tackling global misinformation around HPAI vaccine that FAO and WOAH recommend and that could help ease partners’ decision making.
“Over the past year, the United States government has spent a lot of time questioning vaccines and lending aid and comfort to the conspiracy theorists, rather than standing by the science,” Doug McKalip, President Joe Biden’s chief agricultural negotiator, told Agri-Pulse in a text message.
“Similarly, the U.S. has spent the past year trying to strong-arm trading partners into short-term arrangements. That isn’t conducive to building international consensus and the kind of long-term global acceptance of production tools that U.S. farmers need.”
USA PEEC’s Tyler is also concerned that countries could see a U.S. vaccination campaign as an opportunity to exert some trade policy leverage.
“Some countries would try to use it as a reason to ban our exports,” he said, “especially given the politically charged trade environment we are facing now.”
Noah Wicks contributed to this report.
