In December the nationwide common worth for a dozen eggs was $4.15, a rise of practically $2 in comparison with December 2023. This spike in egg costs has been pushed by a virulent pressure of hen flu that brought about the loss of life of 20 million egg-laying chickens within the final quarter of 2024.
According to the US Department of Agriculture, the hen flu has resulted in near 100 million chickens turkeys and different poultry being killed since early 2022. Most of the birds culled to cease the epidemic have been egg-laying hens, inflicting the worth of eggs to skyrocket and availability to plummet.
Here’s what that you must know concerning the state of affairs.
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What is hen flu?
Birds contaminated with avian influenza will cease consuming water and change into torpid.
Bird flu is brought on by avian influenza Type A viruses, which unfold amongst waterfowl and may infect different wild birds, home poultry and different animals. Although it not often infects people, the present outbreak is chargeable for 67 circumstances within the US and one loss of life, as of this writing.
There are greater than a dozen strains of hen flu, labeled as both “low pathogenic” or “extremely pathogenic,” relying on their means to unfold and kill birds.
The pressure bombarding the US proper now, Eurasian H5N1, is taken into account extremely pathogenic. It infects birds’ respiratory and gastrointestinal tracts and may shortly tear via a complete flock. Symptoms embody an absence of urge for food, lethargy, swelling and decreased egg manufacturing.
The essential supply of an infection is geese, geese and different migratory waterfowl, Denise Derrer, public info director for the Indiana State Board of Animal Health, advised CNET.
“They get contaminated however do not get sick,” Derrer mentioned. “Then they shed the virus of their droppings or wherever the land.”
How is hen flu affecting egg costs?
Inflation, labor shortages and provide chain points have contributed to greater grocery costs throughout the board. But hen flu outbreaks are including a premium to the worth of eggs.
In California final week, the common worth for a dozen eggs reached $8.97, based on the USDA’s Egg Market Overview report.
Though demand for eggs has dipped from the vacation season, the USDA mentioned, “shoppers need to modify their dietary selections to assist freshly-minted more healthy life-style resolutions and eggs stay a preferred go-to choice.”
Customers in some states are dealing with empty cabinets and sure supermarkets have began limiting what number of cartons prospects should purchase, together with branches of Whole Foods, Lidl, Kroger and Fred Meyer. It’s unclear how lengthy the scarcity will final.
The final main hen flu epidemic
Between December 2014 and June 2015, the primary hen flu epidemic within the US led to greater than 50 million birds being destroyed, together with one in eight egg-laying hens. Eighty p.c of the birds — some 39 million — had been euthanized between mid-April and mid-May 2015 alone.
Prices shortly soared in consequence, with the price of eggs practically doubling and the worth of wholesale hen breast costs remaining inflated for years, based on the USDA’s Economic Research Service.
Although the company known as the 2014-2015 epidemic “the biggest poultry well being catastrophe in US historical past” the present outbreak has already lasted longer and resulted within the deaths of extra birds.
