Avian Influenza Virus
Avian influenza, also known as bird flu, is a viral disease that mainly affects birds. However, it can also spread to mammals – including people.
There are 2 main types of avian influenza:
- high pathogenicity avian influenza (HPAI), which can cause severe signs and high death rates in birds. There are a number of strains including H5, H7, and H9
- low pathogenicity avian influenza (LPAI), which typically causes few or no signs in birds but can possibly mutate to HPAI.
Strains of HPAI have circulated globally for years. Many countries have seasonal outbreaks in poultry every year.
New Zealand has been monitoring the spread of HPAI globally for the past 20 years. Biosecurity New Zealand have surveillance programmes in place to detect the arrival of HPAI and other exotic diseases.
A strain of avian influenza, H7N6, was detected at an Otago egg farm in December 2024. This strain is likely to have developed from interactions with local waterfowl and wild birds. While it is not the H5N1 type circulating among wildlife around the world that has caused concern, we are taking the find seriously.
A strain of bird flu (H7N6) in Otago
LPAI is present in wild birds in New Zealand. MPI have an active surveillance programme for LPAI and test around 2,000 samples from wild birds each year.
Similarly to the MBovis repsonse, be vigilant about washing down your vehicles regularly, know the status of the farms you are working on and be sure to scrub and disinfect your vehicle, hands, and boots should you suspect any contact with the virus.
The spread of pests and weeds by vehicles and machinery can have significant consequences for our farmer clients.
A basic standard of machine hygiene should apply to all machinery movements farm to farm.
It should not take a notified biosecurity incursion for all people travelling on to farms to develop and practice sound hygiene measures to prevent the transmission of any weed or disease. In fact, a sound biosecurity policy for every groundspreading company adds to the level of service offered to farmer clients giving a competitive edge to well-run groundspreading businesses. We also must remember that anything that adversely affects our farmer clients’ business, also adversely affects our business.
Click below for a sample Biosecurity Protocol for Groundspread NZ members to apply to their businesses by distributing to their clients.