WED AM News: Bird flu poses ‘significant’ threat to state’s dairy industry, UW expert says; First NEVI-funded EV charging stations online in Wisconsin

January 8, 2025

— A UW-Madison expert warns of “significant” economic damage in the state if a circulating strain of the bird flu hits Wisconsin’s dairy industry.

California declared an emergency in December after discovering bird flu in more than 600 dairy herds, raising concerns about the disease spreading further in 2025.

Prof. Keith Poulsen, director of the Wisconsin Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratory, says the western state is getting hit hard by the B3.13 form of bird flu, though he added “we have no indication” that it’s currently present in Wisconsin dairy cows.

Still, Poulsen said “it wouldn’t surprise me” if the virus showed up in Wisconsin cows, noting that could happen at any time. Experts still aren’t sure exactly how it’s spreading, he explained, whether it’s through milk or respiratory secretions or on people’s shoes and clothes.

“When you look at that nationally, B3.13 is still spreading, although it’s kind of come off peak spread in many states, California is probably still our biggest hotspot,” he said in a recent interview before the first U.S. bird flu death was reported yesterday. “We are starting to see infections of farms that were previously infected, and there was one reported in Colorado and one in Texas.”

To illustrate the potential impact in Wisconsin, Poulsen pointed to estimates out of Cornell University that show the 90-day cost is about $191 per lactating cow on the farm. He says that amounts to about $1 million per month per 5,000 cows.

“Now when you think about that, the average herd size in Wisconsin is 200, and we have 5,400 dairies,” he said. “So, you know, not every farm is going to lose $1 million a month. But there are herds out there that are 5,000 head, and there’s some that are double that. So if [bird] flu were to come into Wisconsin, it would be a significant economic burden.”

At the same time, milk prices are “in a profitable zone” now while feed prices are also normal, “which is the total opposite” of recent years, Poulsen said. That raises the stakes for potential bird flu outbreaks in early 2025, as farmers are facing pressure to produce more milk in the favorable price environment, he said.

“It does represent a pretty substantial risk to a potentially very profitable year for milk production,” he said.

When bird flu does infect a dairy farm, the cost of lost production from sick cows — as well as labor and medicine — are being largely shouldered by the farmers themselves, according to Poulsen. The overall cost of the disease is on both farmers and taxpayers, as the USDA pays for testing and indemnities on lost milk, he added.

Plus, the potential risk to public health “could be very expensive.” While the CDC currently considers the risk to humans to be “low but not zero,” Poulsen said, the longer the virus is around, the more that risk goes up.

He also spotlighted the “huge strain” being put on the national supply of heifers, which are young female cows that haven’t had any offspring. The replacement cost for heifers is now two to three times as high as it was just 18 months ago.

“That’s a pretty substantial impact on farms that need to expand, or for U.S. dairy to export those animals to markets that are exploding right now, specifically in countries like Indonesia, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Algeria, Kenya, Tanzania, Morocco — that’s where the markets are really, really growing quickly,” he said.

As ripple effects from the virus continue to play out, several labs in Wisconsin are conducting what Poulsen calls “soft surveillance” for bird flu, testing retail samples off the shelf. The WVDL has also been testing some milk samples, but neither have found any evidence for the virus in the state, he said. One possible reason is Wisconsin doesn’t import many lactating cows, limiting the chance for possible spread through that avenue.

The USDA in December announced plans for nationwide testing of milk for bird flu, with states being brought into the program in stages over time based on the prevalence of the virus.

In hopes of preventing an outbreak in the state, Poulsen recommends farmers should be testing all lactating animals coming on the farm, restricting non-essential people from being there and deploy stringent biosecurity measures such as requiring clean clothes, boots and handwashing.

“Those are three things that I think are low-hanging fruit and every dairy farmer can do it,” he said.

— The state’s first electric vehicle charging stations funded by the National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure Formula Program are now online, state officials announced.

Gov. Tony Evers yesterday touted the launch of charging stations at Kwik Trip locations in Ashland, Menomonie and Chippewa Falls in December, with more stations slated to start operating in coming months.

The state Department of Transportation has been authorized to receive and administer more than $78 million in NEVI funding, and officials last year announced $23 million for 53 EV charging station projects in Wisconsin.

Evers in a statement praised the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law for providing the NEVI funding, noting expanding EV charging “is a critical part of our work to ensure Wisconsin is ready to compete and build the future we want for our kids — one that is cleaner, more sustainable, and more efficient.”

See the release.

— Two companies with solutions for addressing microplastics contamination have won $10,000 prizes through the Water Council’s Tech Challenge.

The Milwaukee-based organization yesterday announced the winners of its latest round of competition, focused on products for detecting, treating and removing microplastics and. These miniscule pieces of plastic have been deemed a major environmental and health hazard.

Karen Frost, vice president of economic development and innovation for the Water Council, says scientists are “only beginning to understand the alarming scope and scale” of microplastic solution, but argues solutions are needed.

“By connecting these innovators with water technology corporations, we help nourish solutions in the effort to fight water contamination,” she said in a statement.

One of the contest winners, California-based Lucendi, Inc., is developing AI technology for detecting and characterizing micro-scale objects within liquids. The company’s Aqusens platform can identify microplastics as well as tiny harmful organisms such as toxic algae and cyanobacteria.

The other winner, New Jersey’s PolyGone Systems, was chosen for its treatment and removal solution. Based on Princeton University research, the company has created a filtration system that captures microplastics below 1 millimeter in scale and can be used in rivers, lakes and wastewater discharge areas.

See the release.

— Marquette University’s School of Dentistry is creating a new consortium to standardize dental education and lower tuition.

The university this week announced it’s received a $1.37 million grant from the U.S. Department of Education to create the Open Dental Education Consortium. The group also includes Chippewa Valley Technical College and Milwaukee Area Technical College as well as Brigham Young University in Utah.

Ultimately, partners in the effort aim to have ODEC resources adopted in dental education institutions across the United States and abroad, the release shows. The consortium is targeting students “of all levels” of dental programs, including predoctoral tracks as well as dental hygiene and assisting.

Dr. Elisabeta Karl, associate dean of academic affairs and principal investigator on the award, highlights a “major gap” in the educational landscape, noting open educational resources haven’t been widely adopted in dental education.

“Faculty members at the consortium institutions will collaborate with student instructional designers to develop the curriculum, which will benefit dental students from both two-year degree granting institutions and doctoral level provider programs,” she said, adding the consortium is expected to save each student $1,000 during the grant period.

Through the program, members will educate faculty and others about open educational resources, and those interested in creating such resources will work with graduate student “instructional designers” to do so. The consortium will host all the open resources online at a website associated with EdTech Books, a free educational content compiler.

See the release.

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