{"id":147091,"date":"2025-09-16T02:38:08","date_gmt":"2025-09-16T02:38:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/147091\/"},"modified":"2025-09-16T02:38:08","modified_gmt":"2025-09-16T02:38:08","slug":"nebraska-confirms-states-first-case-of-bird-flu-in-dairy-herd-as-us-outbreak-persists","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/147091\/","title":{"rendered":"Nebraska confirms state’s first case of bird flu in dairy herd as US outbreak persists"},"content":{"rendered":"

Nebraska has confirmed its first case of bird flu in a dairy cattle herd as a lingering 18-month outbreak<\/a> continues to afflict livestock nationwide, the U.S. Department of Agriculture announced Monday.<\/p>\n

The state’s department of agriculture, aided by the USDA\u2019s Animal Plant Health Inspection Service, said in a press release<\/a> that it had confirmed the case of highly pathogenic avian influenza<\/a> in a central Nebraska herd and that the herd had been quarantined.<\/p>\n

Though decelerating, cases of H5N1 bird flu have now been confirmed in more than 1,000 herds across 17 U.S. states since the virus<\/a> was initially found in dairy cows in March 2024, according to the USDA<\/a>, including cases this year in Texas, Arizona, Idaho, Nevada, Michigan and California.<\/p>\n

The National Veterinary Services Laboratories said the strain resembles one found in California, the department said, adding that with care, dairy cattle typically recover with little to no associated mortality.<\/p>\n

While the threat to humans remains low, the continuing spread of the virus to dairy cattle and other mammals could indicate it\u2019s edging toward becoming communicable among people, a development that a University of Pennsylvania microbiology professor has described<\/a> as \u201clike a pandemic unfolding in slow motion.\u201d<\/p>\n

At least 70 people<\/a> have been infected with the virus nationwide, including 41 exposed to the virus by dairy cows. Symptoms<\/a> are similar to the common flu, including fever, chills, body aches, sore throat, eye irritation and tiredness. <\/p>\n

The virus most commonly spreads among wild birds but can also infect poultry, livestock and other mammals<\/a>, including goats, coyotes and opossums. An outbreak among chickens earlier this year prompted an extensive egg shortage<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"Nebraska<\/p>\n

Nebraska and USDA officials confirmed the state’s first case of bird flu in a dairy cattle herd on Sept. 15, 2025, as a worsening 18-month outbreak continued to afflict livestock nationwide.<\/p>\n

Infection can lower a herd\u2019s milk production by about a fifth<\/a>, according to dairy industry experts.<\/p>\n

Among those\u00a0most at risk of infection<\/a>\u00a0are farmers, animal care providers such as veterinarians or other workers exposed to infected animals or animal products.<\/p>\n

In early January, a backyard flock keeper hospitalized with bird flu in Louisiana became the first person<\/a> in the U.S.\u00a0to die of the disease after contracting the virus\u2019 D1.1 variant<\/a>. The individual was older than 65 years old and was reported to have underlying medical conditions.<\/p>\n

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Bird flu: Nebraska dairy herd hit as national outbreak continues<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Nebraska has confirmed its first case of bird flu in a dairy cattle herd as a lingering 18-month…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":147092,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[5650,49,48,78458,78460,84,6403,12369,78459],"class_list":{"0":"post-147091","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-health","8":"tag-bird-flu","9":"tag-ca","10":"tag-canada","11":"tag-dairy-cattle","12":"tag-h5n1-bird-flu","13":"tag-health","14":"tag-nebraska","15":"tag-u-s-department-of-agriculture","16":"tag-usdas-animal-plant-health-inspection-service"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/147091","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=147091"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/147091\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/147092"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=147091"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=147091"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=147091"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}