April 26, 2024 – A nationwide survey found traces of the bird flu virus in a single in five retail samples of pasteurized milk.
The FDA said on Thursday in a Online update that finding traces of the virus doesn’t mean that the live virus has entered the milk supply and that “the studies on milk retail have not produced any results that would change our assessment that the commercial milk supply is safe.”
But the detection of traces of the virus in 20 percent of milk samples could indicate that the bird flu outbreak in dairy cows is more widespread than initially thought, an authority said.
“The number seems high when the number of farms infected is actually only about 30,” said Dr. Richard Webby, a virologist and flu expert at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital. NBC News. “Obviously there are more infected animals than are being reported.”
The USDA said that as of Thursday, bird flu had been detected in 33 dairy herds in at the least eight states: Idaho, Kansas, Michigan, New Mexico, North Carolina, South Dakota, Ohio and Texas.
The FDA update noted that a better proportion of positive tests were on account of milk from areas with infected dairy herds, however the federal agency declined to say what number of samples were tested, based on NBC News.
The news comes after the FDA first announced on Tuesday that traces of the virus had been detected in pasteurized milk.
At the time, the FDA said the country's milk supply was protected due to pasteurization process and the “diversion and destruction of milk from sick cows.”
Also this week the USDA said that every one cows transported across national borders should be tested for bird flu.