United States Restricts Import of Vaccinated French Ducks

Because France is also part of the European Poultry Trading Region (EPTR, excluding Great Britain), the new import rules also apply to duck products from these countries, as well as from Iceland, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, and Norway. The Netherlands is currently conducting field trials with the vaccination of chicks to develop a vaccine for chicks and chickens, but has not yet made a decision on vaccinating all poultry.

The United States itself is also struggling with avian influenza and has already imposed restrictions on all countries where the disease occurs. Until relatively recently – except for China, Indonesia, Egypt, Vietnam, and Hong Kong – most countries have so far refrained from vaccination in favor of the international recommendation to control HPAI infections by culling infected flocks.

Since then, several countries – including France – have announced plans to switch to poultry vaccination. This could have a major impact on international trade because countries that do not vaccinate are unwilling to import poultry from countries that do. Literally billions of dollars are at stake.

Although the United States is already conducting trials with poultry vaccines, these vaccines are currently not approved for use in American poultry. Now that France is about to roll out its vaccination campaign for poultry, the USDA tightened the rules yesterday. The USDA inspection service is consulting with the European Commission on further restrictions.