Bird flu outbreak in US isn’t timed for November elections; it began in 2022

World Health Organization Chief Scientist Dr. Jeremy Farrar expressed concern in an April 18 news conference about an outbreak of the bird flu, known as H5N1, at U.S. dairy farms. He urged health officials to better monitor and prepare in case the virus evolves and begins spreading among humans.

At least three U.S. farm workers have been infected with the virus, but there’s no evidence of human-to-human transmission, Farrar said, calling it a "global zoonotic animal pandemic."

Nevertheless, some social media users are using his words and other bird flu news to suggest that unknown actors are planning a new pandemic in an election year.

"Tell me the Presidential elections coming up without telling me Presidential elections coming up," a May 12 Instagram post said in sticker text on a video of Farrar speaking about avian influenza.

The post noted that 70 people In Colorado are "under surveillance for having potentially contracted bird flu," and included the hashtags #WAKEUPAMERICA, #BYDESIGN AND #SCAMDEMIC.

It’s unclear how the poster thinks a bird flu pandemic would affect the  U.S. elections in November. But the claim echoes similar widely debunked claims that elites planned the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, also an election year. Some of them said COVID-19 was created to hurt former President Donald Trump’s chances at re-election.

We found multiple examples of social media users — some using the same video of Farrar — tying the bird flu news to the upcoming election and suggesting unnamed forces are using the virus to spread fear and exert control.

This post was flagged as part of Meta’s efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram.)

(Instagram screenshot)

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The Instagram post shared clips of Farrar at the April 18 WHO news conference in Geneva., responding to a question about the bird flu virus that has spread globally, infecting dairy cows in the U.S.

The H5N1 virus has been found in U.S. birds since 2022 and has infected more than 92 million birds in 48 states, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said. The virus has spread to mammals, with outbreaks reported in dozens of dairy herds in nine states. 

But there is no bird flu pandemic in the U.S., at least among humans. Farrar urged strong surveillance of the virus so health officials can be prepared with vaccines and therapeutics should it evolve to spread between humans.

"The great concern, of course, is that in doing so and infecting ducks and chickens — but now increasingly mammals — that that virus now evolves and develops the ability to infect humans. And then critically, the ability to go from human-to-human transmission," he said.

Avian influenza is not a planned or engineered virus. It occurs naturally among wild birds, such as ducks and geese that can also infect domestic birds, such as chickens and turkeys, and mammals. Highly pathogenic strains of the virus can cause severe infection and death in birds. There have been global bird flu outbreaks in animals throughout the years, including in the U.S. in 2014-15. The first description of the bird flu was in 1878 in northern Italy. The H5N1 strain was first found in waterfowl in China in 1996.

Human cases of bird flu are rare, but have occurred globally for nearly three decades, the CDC said. The virus is frequently lethal to humans — about 52% of the 887 people diagnosed with the virus worldwide since 2004 have died, the WHO said.

The CDC said the risk is low for humans and that the risk depends on exposure to infected animals.

Thus far, only two people — a Texas dairy farm worker in April and a Michigan farm worker in May — have been infected with the bird flu linked to dairy farms; each had reported mild symptoms. An earlier human case was diagnosed in a Colorado poultry farm worker in 2022.

The Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment told CBS News earlier this month that about 70 dairy farm workers from two farms were being monitored for bird flu symptoms after being exposed to the virus.

A claim that the bird flu outbreak in the U.S. is being planned to affect the U.S. presidential elections ignores that the H5N1 virus occurs naturally and that bird flu has existed for more than a century. The H5N1 strain was first found in 1996 in southern China. The current outbreak affecting dairy cattle emerged in the U.S. in 2022. The claim is False.