TV personality and U.S. federal health official Dr. Mehmet Oz has reiterated an offer to house hundreds of B.C. ostriches facing a cull order, claiming the birds are scientifically unique.
Over 400 birds at Universal Ostrich farm in Edgewood, B.C., have been ordered culled by the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) after highly pathogenic avian flu was detected on the farm last December.
The order has survived multiple court challenges by the farm and has attracted attention from U.S. officials like Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., as well as questions from dedicated supporters over whether the Canadian government was overreaching with the cull order.
The CFIA and federal officials have said that the cull order is part of a broader response to protect food systems from an avian flu virus that has led to millions of domestic birds dying in Canada in the last few years.
At a Monday news conference, Dr. Oz, U.S. billionaire John Catsimatidis and Universal Ostrich spokesperson Katie Pasitney continued to say that the birds were scientifically valuable and there have been no symptoms of avian flu among the flock for months.
But scientists say that officials are erring on the side of caution in ordering the cull, and the claims of scientific value from the farm and its supporters may not pass muster.
What is Dr. Oz proposing?
Dr. Oz said Monday that he had written to Prime Minister Mark Carney and requested special dispensation to take over 400 ostriches and house them at his farm in Florida.
He said that Kennedy Jr. had spoken to Jay Bhattacharya, the head of the U.S. National Institute of Health, and they were willing to research the animals to see if they have antibodies that could help them tolerate the virus.
After losing an appeal to stop a cull order, the owners of a B.C. ostrich farm have vowed to keep fighting and are preparing to take the case to the Supreme Court of Canada. The cull was ordered last December after an avian flu outbreak.
“By killing off animals that had survived and resisted infection, we not only lose insights about how they did it, but we’d also lose their resistance,” Oz said.
Farm lawyer Umar Sheikh told CBC News that the farm was planning to take its court challenge of the order all the way to the Supreme Court of Canada.
Are the ostriches truly scientifically unique?
The farm claims it pivoted away from meat processing during the COVID-19 pandemic to focus instead on research, specifically on trying to use ostrich eggs to produce antibodies for COVID-19 or other viruses.
The farm says it partnered with Yasuhiro Tsukamoto of Kyoto Prefectural University in Japan for this work. Neither Tsukamoto nor the university has responded to CBC News in relation to the story, but the researcher, known in some circles as “Dr. Ostrich,” has previously made headlines for his work with ostrich eggs and COVID-19.
A previous CFIA statement, however, states the farm has failed to substantiate its claims that the ostriches are being used for scientific research, stating that the “CFIA has not received any evidence of scientific research being done at the infected premises.”
“Further, the current physical facilities at their location are not suitable for controlled research activities or trials,” the CFIA statement reads.
Angela Rasmussen, a virologist at the University of Saskatchewan, says the decision to cull 400 ostriches at a southern B.C. farm is ‘the best way to reduce transmission’ to humans and other animals. This comes after Universal Ostrich Farms lost its case to save the birds from a cull order issued by the Canadian Food Inspection Agency.
A veterinary scientist says that there’s very little evidence so far to indicate that Universal Ostrich’s birds are unique in any particular way.
“People who are mentioning this, I think, are trying to find arguments to prevent euthanasia,” said Jean-Pierre Vaillancourt, a professor at the University of Montreal’s veterinary school.
“I can understand that, but I don’t see there’s [anything] fantastic or remarkable about the blood of these animals, unfortunately.”
Can ostriches carry the avian flu without showing symptoms?
Vaillancourt said that it’s entirely possible for birds to be infected and not display symptoms.
The CFIA has previously said that its objective with the cull is to prevent further spread of highly pathogenic avian flu to wild birds and to humans.
The owners of a B.C. ostrich farm have found high-profile allies in their fight to save their birds, including Dr. Oz and U.S. health secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Veterinarian and Centre for Public Health and Zoonoses director Dr. Scott Weese told BC Today host Michelle Eliot why he thinks the case has received so much attention and whether he believes the birds should be tested for avian flu.
“They can be healthy carriers,” Vaillancourt said. “If they have the virus, then that virus is circulating and potentially replicating, mutating. And now we have, also, a public health issue to consider.
“When we have a serious situation, we often err on the side of caution.”
Why did the CFIA order the cull?
The CFIA has pointed to Canada’s international obligations under a treaty signed with the World Organisation for Animal Health, and its need to preserve food supply chains, as another reason for the cull.
J. Scott Weese, director of the Centre for Public Health and Zoonoses at the University of Guelph, said that the international community has to trust that Canada is doing what it can to limit the risk to other animals when shipping food.
“I think there’s got to be something done so that we can appropriately control disease, and we can’t rest on the laurels that, ‘We got lucky, that nothing bad happened here,’ right?'” he said on Monday.
“You know, you only get lucky so many times when it comes to emerging diseases.”
Can’t the birds simply be tested again?
The farm has previously filed applications to allow its birds to be tested again for avian flu as it fought the cull — a request that was denied by the courts.
Vaillancourt noted that extensive testing would likely be expensive and require a controlled environment, saying there would be “very little point” in testing if the birds weren’t contained.
The farm has previously been fined $20,000 by the CFIA for not adhering to federal orders to quarantine the birds at the farm.
Weese said that he wasn’t dogmatic on culling the birds, but that a decision not to cull amid the court challenges could set a bad precedent.
“What we can’t have is every farm that has a positive bird now just weaponizing the court system and saying, ‘No, I’m not going to depopulate. We’ll just stall,'” the professor said.
“That’s how you don’t control birds. That’s how you end up not being trusted by the international community.”
