Avian Bird Flu - Preventatives?

[TJAnonymous]

I was just reading an article this morning that said avian flu has now spread to 12 states! Dept of Ag is looking at culling 2.75 million birds, both backyard flocks and commercial flocks. Naturally I am concerned....

Other than biosecurity, is anyone doing anything else to protect their flocks? I don't go visiting other places where people have chickens and no one else comes to my farm, but I do have TONS of wild birds around all the time so there's always an avenue of spread that I can't control.

What about preventatives? Would Ivermectin help? Anything else?

 

[azygous]

https://www.alltech.com/blog/how-prevent-avian-influenza-poultry Goes over the common sense methods to keep your flock safe.

There are sometimes many different strains of a virus, and those are often going through mutations, changing so rapidly that science can't nail down a strain long enough to come up with an antiviral that will be effective.

Ivermectin had proven effective on some viruses that have not rapidly mutated into drastically varied strains, but bird flu isn't one of these cooperative viruses. There are no studies that show it's effective as a treatment or a preventative for bird flu.

 

[azygous]

To clarify, the flu drugs oseltamivir (Tamiflu), peramivir (Rapivab), or zanamivir (Relenza) can be used to treat avian flu in humans.

 

[TJAnonymous]

I was reading one article that said to make sure that if you have a run, it has a solid covering, and the fence surrounding your run was covered to prevent wild birds from entering to get to the feed. So... poultry netting it is! Pain in the ars, but totally worth it to protect your flock. We have all invested way too much time, energy and love into these birds to have them simply wiped out. It comes down to this, we do what we can... ALL that we can, and we pray it works. Right now, my county in Iowa is surrounded by it. The hatchery where I got my chicks is surrounded also. And, unfortunately, my DIL's family co-ops with the place that just went positive 2 days ago. They also have a large commercial turkey farm in Buena Vista County. They must test daily and maintain strict biosecurity. This is a nightmare... but, it happens every few years. My main concern is protecting my flock and making sure they are all healthy and safeguarded. I'm trying not to consider how these things will affect an already stressed food chain and inflation. It will drive me crazy. The wild birds that are so accustomed to me feeding them are quite angry with me right now. But unfortunately, they are all public enemy #1 till this is over....

Yeah, I was looking at the Iowa HPAI map this morning and saw how McMurray's and Hoovers literally have it at their doorstep. I can't imagine the stress they must be under. I've decided if cases start popping up in Arkansas, I will build a small covered run off the coop inside my big run. I will end up breaking all recommendations for run size but it can't be helped. I would only be able to put in a 20 ft x 10 ft covered & protected run maybe...and I have 56 birds in my coop. But I'd rather have them stressed from being crowded than lose my entire flock! I simply have limited options. The best I can do is try to maximize vertical as well as horizontal space in that area.

 

[Wyorp Rock]

I'm sure there's quite a bit of info covered in this ongoing thread about AI, you may want to read through the links that folks have posted.
https://www.backyardchickens.com/threads/avian-influenza-found-in-south-carolina.1507893/

 

[TJAnonymous]

You have a point. I often have the notion myself of just throwing a med at a problem just to see what would happen with my one chicken, my very own clinical trial if you will. I did this a couple years ago when I thought some pullets had Marek's and I wanted to see if the anti-viral herpes med acyclovir would work against it.

As for whether millions of birds are "worth it", probably not in our cynical economic system where it's cheaper and easier to simply kill all infected and suspected infected birds and start all over. The industry sets the demand and the pharmaceutical industry then decides if it's cost/profit effective enough to start doing drug trials. Bird flu has been around since 1997 when it was discovered in both birds and humans. Seems we'd have a med for it by now if any of the powers-that-be cared to find it.

I just got off the phone with someone who works in poultry research. He said that, to his knowledge, it has NOT been tested. He said that it would require a Level 3 biolab to do this kind of testing with AI. There is a lab in Georgia which is doing some testing in regards to AI but he isn't sure if they are looking at Ivermectin as a preventative or treatment. He said that commercial houses would absolutely be interested in finding something as a preventative or treatment because of the financial hit they are taking when entire farms are culled. He said there is a vaccine for AI but the problem with vaccines and viruses is problems with efficacy due to viral mutation. This is why therapeutics are often better than vaccines because they can target specific strains. He did say that delivery could be problematic since a commercial farm could have 3M or more birds. How do you ensure they all get the right dosage without going bird by bird?

You could tell he was intrigued by the idea, though, so he is going to bring it up at meeting on the 25th and see if anyone is doing this kind of research or even interested in it.

 

[TJAnonymous]

This news just came in. https://www.wsj.com/articles/iverme...izations-in-largest-trial-to-date-11647601200

I know this topic is very sensitive and political... And not totally relevant to Avian Influenza... So I won't delve into that subject further except to say I have been involved in conversations starting in January 2020 from a national security level and don't believe what comes out in media sources. Lots of information being twisted, buried, and censored for financial and political gain. I'm not here to convince anyone or change their beliefs about Covid. Believe whatever you want to believe...

My purpose with this thread was to discuss antiviral efficacy of Ivermectin or other potential therapeutics as a treatment or preventative for AI. There are many documented and peer-reviewed cases which support antiviral efficacy of Ivermectin around a wide range of viruses. Those studies indicate that this drug could be promising in treatment of chickens against AI based upon its efficacy in treatment of humans with Avian Influenza.

 

[Folly's place]

My flock of 42, which does include some bantams, has been locked in their 24' x 13' coop, covered run, which fortunately has five separate areas where they can be out of sight of each other, for weeks now. So much for free ranging this spring!
Everyone is doing fine, way better than having them all dead at once over this.
Mary

 

[azygous]

You have a point. I often have the notion myself of just throwing a med at a problem just to see what would happen with my one chicken, my very own clinical trial if you will. I did this a couple years ago when I thought some pullets had Marek's and I wanted to see if the anti-viral herpes med acyclovir would work against it.

As for whether millions of birds are "worth it", probably not in our cynical economic system where it's cheaper and easier to simply kill all infected and suspected infected birds and start all over. The industry sets the demand and the pharmaceutical industry then decides if it's cost/profit effective enough to start doing drug trials. Bird flu has been around since 1997 when it was discovered in both birds and humans. Seems we'd have a med for it by now if any of the powers-that-be cared to find it.

 

[addctd2plnts]

Do you know if it has even been tested against Avian Influenza?

As I mentioned above, I realize that the viruses it has shown effective against are NOT AI but I'm betting it has never been tested (in chickens specifically). That could mean it COULD be effective and just hasn't been tested. Or maybe it's not at all, such as with Zika (in mice).

I'm just saying...aren't 2.75 million birds (and counting) worth giving it a try?



Source - https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7290143/

I agree, your thought process is very valid medically, and there are a number of medical articles that point to its possible use in humans infected with avian influenza. It looks like because it has jumped to humans in isolated cases, they are being forced into killing all exposed birds due to the mortality rate in humans. Depending on the article, the humans that got it had 35%-80% mortality. Remember that this is worldwide so many of the treating countries were not even close to real medical standards. So, though the Dept of Ag is not making big deal about the potential jump to humans, it looks like the real reason they are killing the birds, though they want to stop the spread in birds, is to prevent the virus from mutating to one that can easily be spread to humans, or heaven forbid, between humans. There are some articles says it has jumped to pigs in some cases. I seem to remember when it does this, it's much more likely to then be able to mutate and jump to humans. Of course to protect the food chain and mass starvation in many countries they want to prevent this jump too.

This article discusses the wide variety of viruses Ivermectin has been effective against. The first part of Table 1 shows all the viruses: https://mdpi-res.com/d_attachment/cells/cells-09-02100/article_deploy/cells-09-02100-v2.pdf