‘Crisis mode’: Gov. Josh Shapiro outlines severity of PA bird flu surge

Gov. Josh Shapiro met with state lawmakers and agricultural industry leaders on Tuesday to provide an update on Pennsylvania’s response to a spike in bird flu infections, describing the state as the epicenter of a nationwide surge of highly pathogenic avian influenza cases.

Shapiro said that 26 flocks have been infected by the virus so far this year, accounting for roughly 7.6 million birds – more than half of the cases seen across the United States this year. 

To date, 42 commercial flocks have been infected by bird flu nationwide in 2026, with more than 10 million affected birds across January and February, according to data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

“We are obviously in crisis mode when it comes to high-path avian influenza,” Shapiro said Tuesday during a roundtable discussion at a Lancaster County rapid response center managed by the state Department of Agriculture and Penn Ag Industries. 

Lancaster County has been hit particularly hard by new bird flu infections, driven by its status as one of the most densely populated poultry counties in the country, according to State Veterinarian Alex Hamberg. According to USDA data, more than 7.3 million birds in Lancaster County have been affected by the surge over the last two months. 

At the roundtable, the governor was joined by Pennsylvania Secretary of Agriculture Russell Redding, leaders of the state House and state Senate Agriculture Committees, and state Senate Appropriations Committee Chair Scott Martin, among others. 

Last week, the Shapiro administration announced that it was deploying up to six additional state employees to support HPAI response efforts, and the governor said Tuesday that he had authorized Redding to hire 11 additional people to complement bird flu response efforts. 

Shapiro said he has been in regular contact with President Donald Trump’s administration regarding bird flu outbreaks, and said he asked U.S. Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins to keep federal staff in Pennsylvania to assist with the response for as long as possible. 

He also asked the United States Department of Agriculture to relax federal requirements on veterinarians that will help the state increase its complement. 

Shapiro discussed the potential for poultry vaccines with federal government leaders, though he noted that vaccines for the virus likely won’t be available anytime soon. 

“I want to be clear: This is not something that we’re going to be able to deploy in communities tomorrow. This is going to be more of a long game that we’re going to have to play here,” Shapiro said. 

As for how the most recent bird flu surge could impact consumers, egg providers from across the state don’t see any short-term impacts on egg prices. 

"The U.S. egg industry has plenty of supply for the pending market, so there will be no major spikes currently – as long as it stays contained to Pennsylvania,” said Mark Sauder, president and CEO of Lititz-based Sauder’s Eggs. “I don't see that changing at the moment."

Hamberg, the state veterinarian, added that past egg price increases caused by HPAI were driven by large outbreaks in other states that occurred simultaneously.

“There was a very large outbreak going on in California that wiped out, I believe it was roughly 70% of their poultry. That’s a major egg state. That was compounded by that flipping back and forth of the virus through dairy cattle, to poultry, back to cattle, and back and forth again,” Hamberg said. “At the same time, Ohio – another large egg-producing state – got hit very hard in the heart of their egg production area, as well as neighboring Indiana. So that took out three very large areas of egg production all at the same time.” 

“What we’re seeing here, while devastating, is a very different scale than what we saw about a year ago,” he added.

In the absence of vaccines for poultry, agriculture leaders present at Tuesday’s roundtable discussion stressed the importance of implementing biosecurity measures designed to reduce the spread of HPAI. 

Biosecurity protocols include wearing dedicated shoes and clothing when working with birds, washing hands frequently, disinfecting vehicles and equipment, limiting visits from nonessential farm personnel, using fences or netting to deter rodents and wild birds. 

“That has to be, every day, front-and-center in every poultry operator – and then the extended community that goes with it,” Redding said of biosecurity measures. “Everybody has got to be doing the right biosecurity, living that biosecurity, and then adhering to it – and getting everybody else who comes on the premise – either works there or comes into service in some way – has to be on board.”

Astin Melhorn, the president of Melhorn Sales, Service & Trucking, a Mount Joy-based poultry transportation company, agreed. 

“The only thing I wanted to encourage and just reiterate is the need for biosecurity and making sure we’re doing it right,” he said. “I really think as we wait for a vaccine, what we can do now is make sure we don’t spread it.”

Shapiro also highlighted recent state funding for a grant program that provides assistance to farms, industries and businesses that have suffered bird flu-related damages – and praised the General Assembly’s ability to work across bipartisan lines to protect the state’s $7.1 billion poultry industry. 

“You’ve got Democrats here, you’ve got Republicans here,” he said. “There is no partisan way to address high-path avian influenza. It requires all of us to work together.”