Opinion: H5N1 communication has been strictly for the birds. Didn’t the federal government learn anything from Covid?
When it comes to federal agencies communicating to the public about H5N1 bird flu, it feels like a classic case of Yogi Berra’s déjà vu all over again.
In the wake of pointed criticism about its failure to release new information about the growing H5N1 outbreak in livestock, the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service of the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) on April 21 — four weeks after the outbreak first hit the media — “data dumped” genetic information from cattle on its public database. The posted material further confused the public.
