MeatPoultry Minnesota Governor Tim Walz approved $1.267 million in funding from the Legislative-Citizen Commission on Minnesota Resources (LCCMR) to support research on highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI).
With the funding, researchers at the University of Minnesota’s (U of M) College of Veterinary Medicine will collaborate with state, federal and local partners to ramp up testing of HPAI in wildlife and better understand the threat of the disease beyond the state’s wild and domestic bird populations. Project lead Arno Wuenschmann, professor at the College of Veterinary Medicine, calls HPAI a “ticking time bomb” for animal and human health, even though historically the virus has mainly posed a threat to bird populations.
While previous HPAI outbreaks ended within several months of beginning, the current HPAI wave has been ongoing for nearly three years and has spread beyond birds to mammals, including dairy cows, red foxes, black bears, domestic cats, humans and more.