{"id":186059,"date":"2025-10-02T22:51:10","date_gmt":"2025-10-02T22:51:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/186059\/"},"modified":"2025-10-02T22:51:10","modified_gmt":"2025-10-02T22:51:10","slug":"fate-of-b-c-ostriches-a-hot-political-issue-on-both-sides-of-canada-u-s-border","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/186059\/","title":{"rendered":"Fate of B.C. ostriches a hot political issue on both sides of Canada-U.S. border"},"content":{"rendered":"

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The fate of about 400 ostriches on a B.C. farm has become a hot political issue on both sides of the Canada-U.S. border.<\/p>\n

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Billionaire U.S. philanthropist and animal rights advocate John Catsimatidis and Katie Pasitney, daughter of the co-owner and spokesperson for the Universal\u00a0Ostrich Farm<\/a>,\u00a0held a press conference on Thursday afternoon to once again ask for the birds to be re-tested for avian flu.<\/p>\n

\u201cAll I\u2019m asking for\u00a0(is)\u00a0the Supreme Court of Canada to do the common-sense solution,\u201d Catsimatidis said. \u201cAllow the FDA to test the animals.\u201d<\/p>\n

He added that if Canada doesn\u2019t want the ostriches,\u00a0it should\u00a0allow U.S. government official\u00a0Dr. Mehmet Oz to take them to the United States, a solution that has been floated before.<\/p>\n

Pasitney said she would like to see Canadian leaders step up and support the ostriches.<\/p>\n

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Federal Conservative\u00a0Leader\u00a0Pierre Poilievre was asked about the issue and said\u00a0it\u00a0is another example of \u201ctotal Liberal incompetence.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThey mismanaged this from the very beginning and now they\u2019ve left Canadians and confused\u00a0farmers baffled by the Canadian Food Inspection Agency,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

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Catsimatidis said he and another person are paying for the farm\u2019s legal\u00a0defence, having spent about\u00a0US$35,000 so far.<\/p>\n

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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tCourt halts B.C. ostrich cull\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\tTensions between protesters and the Canadian authorities over a cull order at the farm<\/a> momentarily broke last week, after the Supreme Court halted the killing of hundreds of birds that became infected with avian flu, as it weighed whether to hear the case to spare them.\"\"\/\t<\/p>\n

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The Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) plans to euthanize more than 300 ostriches after members of the flock tested positive for the disease in December. The agency has faced increasing pushback<\/a>\u00a0from the farm and its supporters.<\/p>\n

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Culling of infected birds is standard practice and in line with the\u00a0World Organization for Animal Health<\/a>.
In a\u00a0May federal court ruling<\/a>, a judge found that allowing the birds to remain alive could lead to the spread of avian influenza to other animals, the poultry industry or humans.<\/p>\n

Moreover, the CFIA says \u201cthe application of the stamping out policy for this farm has been upheld by the\u00a0Federal Court of Canada<\/a>\u00a0and the\u00a0Federal Court of Appeal<\/a>\u00a0and is supported by scientific evidence.\u201d<\/p>\n

The\u00a0stamping out<\/a>\u00a0policy is a measure implemented by the World Organization for Animal Health. It mandates that all animals in a flock\u00a0be killed if\u00a0avian flu is present in\u00a0even\u00a0one bird.<\/p>\n

-with files from Rachel Goodman<\/p>\n

\n\t\t&copy 2025 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Descrease article font size Increase article font size The fate of about 400 ostriches on a B.C. farm…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":186060,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[49,48,44,52204,990,2845],"class_list":{"0":"post-186059","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-canada","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-news","11":"tag-ostrich-cull","12":"tag-ostrich-farm","13":"tag-u-s-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/186059","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=186059"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/186059\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/186060"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=186059"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=186059"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=186059"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}