(GEORGIA NEWS NETWORK/SRN NEWS/AP/REUTERS)
*Turkey has begun exporting around 15,000 tons of eggs to the U.S. the outbreak of bird flu continues to slash U.S. production and prices soar. Shipments will begin this month and continue until July.
*More people are trying to bring eggs across the U.S.-Mexico border due to the bird flu outbreak. Authorities say there was a 29% increase in eggs being confiscated at ports of entry between October 2024 and this month, compared with the same time last year. This comes as the price of eggs in the U.S. has surged, which has been attributed to an outbreak of bird flu that has caused chicken populations to decline. According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), the population of conventionally caged chickens has gone down by eight percent.
*The Trump administration is planning a new strategy for fighting bird flu that stresses vaccinations and tighter biosecurity instead of killing off millions of chickens when the disease strikes a flock. The federal government will seek “better ways, with biosecurity and medication and so on” rather than the current standard practice of destroying all the birds on a farm when an infection is detected, according to Kevin Hassett, director of the National Economic Council, who did not elaborate.
*USDA, meanwhile, is scrambling to rehire workers who were involved in the government’s response to the bird flu outbreak. The workers were among the thousands of federal employees eliminated on the recommendations of Elon Musk ‘s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), which is working to carry out President Trump’s promise to streamline and reshape the federal government. But Republican Rep. Don Bacon said the administration should be more careful in how it carries out the cuts.