By Leah Douglas and Julie Steenhuysen
(Reuters) – The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said on Tuesday it plans to spend $10 million to curb farm worker bird flu infections, including $5 million for seasonal flu vaccines, as part of its efforts to avoid further spread and mutation of the virus.
The ongoing outbreak of bird flu has infected poultry flocks in nearly every state since 2022 and more than 170 dairy herds in 13 states since March, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
Thirteen poultry and dairy farm workers have contracted the virus in Colorado, Michigan, and Texas, according to the CDC. Nine of those cases were detected in July among workers killing chickens at two poultry farms with bird flu in Colorado.
The risk to the general public from bird flu is still low, said CDC’s principal director Nirav Shah on a call with reporters.
The agency will allocate $5 million to organizations including the National Center for Farmworker Health to educate and train workers on protecting themselves from bird flu, and another $5 million to providing seasonal flu shots to farm workers, Shah said.
The vaccine push could reduce the risk that workers become co-infected with the seasonal flu and bird flu at the same time, which could lead to flu virus mutations, Shah said.
“Preventing seasonal influenza for these workers, many of whom are also exposed to bird flu, may reduce risks of new strains of influenza emerging,” he said.
The agency is hoping to vaccinate all of the nation’s approximately 200,000 livestock workers, Shah said.
