Minnesota turkey producers battered by HPAI

Commercial turkey facilities in Minnesota are getting hammered by highly pathogenic avian influenza, with HPAI confirmed on Thursday at sites in Le Sueur and Stearns counties, according to the USDA’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service. 
A total of 20,100 birds were affected at the Le Sueur producer, while the facility in Stearns lost 75,000 turkeys, the APHIS tally stated as of Monday. A commercial turkey meat producer in Swift, Minn., lost 33,800 birds after HPAI was confirmed at the site on Tuesday.
HPAI has been confirmed this year in 580 commercial and backyard flocks in 43 states, with 47.86 million birds affected, according to the agency.
The ongoing outbreaks have the U.S. edging closer to the record set in the nation’s deadliest HPAI onslaught in 2015, when 50.5 chickens and turkeys perished.