Minnesota’s dairy herd population has hit a milestone in bird flu testing. Dairy and Meat Inspection Division Director Nicole Neeser says the USDA has declared the state’s dairy herds have been unaffected by the virus…
“We’re excited because we were able to get 4 consecutive months of negative results of really whole heard testing like we did tests virtually every day. We heard in the state each of those months for the dairy industry, this is the next step towards demonstrating that we’re free of the virus.”
Neeser says despite four straight months of clean tests, MDA isn’t stopping testing entirely…
“We’ll continue to do testing at a reduced level and eventually hopefully be able to continue to tail off into other kinds of testing. So not individual producer testing, but more of a a bulk kind of testing that plans. So we’re not having to do so many samples.”
Officials with the MDA say they will reduce the frequency of H5N1 testing from once a month to once every two months.
(content: courtesy MNN)
