US California declares state of emergency over bird flu

Los Angeles, Dec 19 (IANS) California Governor Gavin Newsom declared a state of emergency in response to the outbreak of Avian influenza A (H5N1), commonly known as bird flu, which has infected 34 people in the Golden State.

According to the governor's office, this action came on Wednesday as cases were detected in dairy cows on farms in Southern California, "signaling the need to further expand monitoring and build on the coordinated statewide approach to contain and mitigate the spread of the virus."

To date, no person-to-person spread of bird flu has been detected in California and nearly all infected individuals had exposure to infected cattle, a press release from the office said, adding the state had already established the largest testing and monitoring system in the country to respond to the outbreak, Xinhua news agency reported.

As of Wednesday, the H5N1 virus has spread in 16 states among dairy cattle, following its first confirmed detection in Texas and Kansas in March 2024, data from the US Centers for Disease Control (CDC) showed.

There have been 61 human H5N1 cases nationwide of bird flu since April as the CDC on Wednesday confirmed a person in Louisiana had been hospitalised with a "severe" case of the disease.

However, there have been no reported cases of person-to-person transmission in California, his office said, while people who have been exposed to the virus were exposed to infected cows. California’s Department of Public Health, in an update on December 13, reported that 33 cows so far have tested positive for the virus.

California has also sent protective gear to dairy farms and their workers, advising people who work with cows or raw milk to use the gear to mitigate the risk of contracting the virus, according to the Department of Public Health’s website.

Bird flu was first detected in the US in the wild bird population in South Carolina in January 2022, and in the wild bird population in California in July