USDA APHIS Defend the Flock

“Preventing Avian Influenza Introductions:

Focus on the Big Risks”

WEBINAR TRANSCRIPT: September 23, 2021

DOCTOR JULIE GAUTHIER: Hello, everyone, thank you 

for joining the webinar. Today's presentation, “Preventing Avian 

Influenza Introductions: Focus on the Big Risks” is part of the 

USDA's Defend the Flock campaign promoting awareness about 

the importance of biosecurity and ways to prevent the spread of

infectious poultry diseases. 

We are here today to support you and your flock with 

expanded biosecurity resources, I'm Doctor Julie Gauthier with 

the USDA. Today I'm joined by Doctor Tim Boyer, a biological

scientist with the Center for Epidemiology and Animal Health in 

the USDA APHIS, and Doctor Carol Cardona, the Pomeroy chair 

in avian health for the college of veterinary medicine at the 

University of Minnesota. 

We will give you a few housekeeping items before we get 

started. First, we want to let you know that real time streaming 
captions are available for this program. To view the captions, 

type the caption URL that you see on this slide. 

Bit.ly/APHIS_Fall21Web_CC, type that into your browser. The 

URL appears at the bottom of every slide, so you can link to 

captions at any time during the program. Please note that the 

URL is case sensitive.

To submit questions, click the Q&A button, also located at 

the bottom of the screen. APHIS and our guests will answer all 

your questions after the webinar has concluded. The Q&A will 

be posted along with the recording on APHIS website. Be sure 

to follow the Defend the Flock campaign on Facebook and Twitter 

to find out when the Q&A and recording are available. We will 

share those on-line destinations at the end of the webinar. 

Now we will take a few minutes to introduce ourselves. I'm 

Julie Gauthier, and I'm the assistant director for poultry health 

with the USDA APHIS veterinary services. I'm an epidemiologist

by training, and I have operated a small family farm raising 

poultry. In my USDA role, I lead subject matter experts, who 

coordinate the National Poultry Improvement Plan. 

Doctor Boyer, please tell us a little bit about yourself.

TIM BOYER: Hi, it's a pleasure to be here. So, I'm a 

biological scientist at the USDA APHIS Center for Epidemiology 

and Animal Health. I am on the Transboundary Disease Analytics 

Team. In my role there, I have worked on epidemiologic 

investigations of avian influenza and virulent Newcastle disease,

among others, to identify risk factors, introduction and spread of 
those diseases. I also create the -- simulations of outbreaks in 

livestock and study the epidemiologic behavior of those diseases 

and to evaluate control measures and to support animal 

emergency preparedness activities. I received a Master of Public 

Health and a PhD from the University of Minnesota,

environmental infectious diseases from the school of public health 

there. I've been working in animal health and infectious diseases 

for roughly 15 years.

>> Thanks, Doctor Boyer. Doctor Cardona, please tell us 

about yourself.

CAROL CARDONA: I'm Carol Cardona at the University of 

Minnesota where I hold the BS Pomeroy Chair in avian health. 

I'm part of the secure food systems team, the risk analysis team 

that is part of the secure supply plans. I got my veterinary 

degree from Purdue University and my PhD from Michigan State 

University. I did a residency in poultry medicine at the University 

of California, at Davis, my home state. I'm a diplomate of the 

American College of Poultry Veterinarians. I have worked in, 

with avian influenza viruses for most of my career, and I enjoy 

working collaboratively with producers to help them create 

cooperative disease control plans.

>> Thank you, Doctor Cardona. Talking to people about 

poultry biosecurity is a significant part of my job as it is for my 

guests as well. I thought about the term biosecurity the other 

day, and I realized that I really take it for granted, both its mean 

and how the concept started. It's a term that today I see it used 
to refer to actions to protect any living things, not just poultry, but 

also organizations developing biosecurity plans for other farm 

animals use the term -- developing plans for people, plants, water, 

ecosystems, or entire nations. But I suspect the poultry industry 

invented and used that word first. I think it was right around the 

time of that devastating highly pathogenic influenza outbreak in 

Pennsylvania in the 1980's, I investigated it and the first 

publication I came across was a benefit analysis of management

options for broiler breeder farms that was in the late 1980's. 

Tim, what do you know about the origin of the term 

biosecurity? When did agriculture producers start using that 

word and why?

TIM BOYER: Well, it's hard to nail down exactly, when 

agricultural producers started using that specific word, biosecurity. 

Many of principles and measures that make up biosecurity are old 

and have evolved over time as our understanding of disease risk 

has changed. But historical record that I found helpful in thinking 

about this was the proceedings of the U.S. Animal Health 

Association annual meetings, you can think the thinking about 

what they called sanitation hygiene changed over time. But the 

first time I saw the term biosecurity used in those documents was 

in 1981, it was a recommendation to create educational programs 

directed toward Turkey growers to inform them about the risk of 

low path avian influenza in their flocks without adequate 

biosecurity. So, on this big 600-page document covering a wide 

variety of animal health topics species, biosecurity was only 
mentioned in the context of poultry. So, I think you are right 

about the poultry industry being an early adopter of that term. 

The next time I saw it show up was in 1984, and now the word 

appears many times, all of them are related to one event that you 

just mentioned, the highly pathogenic avian influenza outbreak in 

Pennsylvania. That year there was a discussion about how 

biosecurity practices used at that time weren’t sufficient to prevent 

the spread of HPAI, and once the response really ramped up and 

there were major efforts to educate and step up biosecurity during 

the response and that seemed to be helpful in controlling the 

spread and then there was also recommendations that moving 

forward from that outbreak, each state should activate and 

maintain a sustainable state industry task force that's concerned 

with poultry biosecurity against avian influenza and other 

infectious diseases, so it seems like 1984 was the watershed 

moment for that term biosecurity.

>> Interesting history. Carol, what are your thoughts about 

the concept of biosecurity?

CAROL CARDONA: I don't have a lot to add to that, but I 

do know my older veterinary friends do circle around the idea that 

was a made-up term, that its origins, it did originate with the 

poultry industry or with USDA APHIS in their work with the poultry 

industry. But it was just a word that came out, that was 

completely constructed. And I think the first time I was exposed 

to the concept of biosecurity was when I did my residency at the 

lab in California, and we watched videos about how to apply 
biosecurity to poultry farms. And it was -- that was created by 

USDA APHIS after the 1984 outbreak in Pennsylvania. That was 

the first time I personally was introduced to the terms. Although I 

had gone to veterinarian school, we didn't talk about biosecurity at 

that time.

>> I would like to track down those old videos and take a 

look at them again. Tim, what's your definition for biosecurity.

TIM BOYER: For me, it's a broad term that covers a wide 

range of operations or structural measures, procedures that are 

intended to protect animals against disease and reduce the risk of 

introduction and spread of disease agents. It's about risk and 

requires a risk assessment that's unique to each production 

facility and planning, and implementation to reduce those risks.

DOCTOR JULIE GAUTHIER: Carol, what is your 

definition?

CAROL CARDONA: I think of biosecurity slightly differently. 

I defined it as the only sustainable way to economically produce 

poultry ethically. Biosecurity is the only way we have for many 

diseases to protect birds from disease agents so, that's the only 

way to maintain their health, but it's also the only way to maintain 

their well-being. So, I think about it as biosecurity is a, is 

something that gives us something that we can't do another way.

DOCTOR JULIE GAUTHIER: Let's dive into the details of 

those principles and move on to the next slide. The National 

Poultry Improvement Plan developed the biosecurity principles in 

2016. And since last year, larger poultry producers must have a 
biosecurity plan in place that includes each of these principles for 

them to be eligible for USDA indemnity in the event of a highly 

pathogenic avian influenza outbreak. Tim, how did NPIP arrive 

at these 14 biosecurity principles? And why are they considered 

the minimum measures that all poultry farms should follow.

TIM BOYER: After the 2015 outbreak, there was 

recognition that there was a gap to effective biosecurity and also 

there was a need to give government entities better insight into 

what producers were doing to protect themselves for the 

purposes of indemnity. So, I think the first step to address that 

was an effort by the University of Minnesota and Iowa State and 

APHIS and many others who developed a biosecurity checklist. I 

think it was based on expert opinion and the epidemiologic 

experience with past outbreaks. The checklists were reviewed 

by industry and states, and the NPIP fleshed them out and added 

an auditing component to it, and those become the 14 biosecurity 

principles. 

The reason they are considered minimum measures, they 

really describe the elements and categories of information that 

are needed to have a successful biosecurity program. But they 

don't provide the specifics for each one. An analogy that I 

thought was helpful was recipes for cooking. All recipes have 

minimum requirements to be successful, they need a list of 

ingredients, the quantities of each ingredient, a list of required 

equipment. They need to tell you what to do with all the 

ingredients and what order and for how long. And every recipe 
needs those things, but the specific elements and the level of 

detail required are going to be different for baking a cake from 

scratch versus making toast. 

And it's the same for biosecurity programs, all of them need 

to follow those 14 principles. But the specifics of what is included 

and how it's implemented are going to vary according to what is 

appropriate for a particular site or production system. For 

example, the fifth principle addresses personnel. And it says to 

describe procedures and biosecurity and personal protective 

equipment required for a site dedicated personnel and for 

non-farm personnel. Also, procedures for personnel who have

had recent contact with other poultry species, so, for personal 

protective equipment, that might mean specific clothing and 

boots, or it might mean building specific clothing and boots. 

Disposal boots, clothes, masks, maybe a Danish entry system

those 14 principles, they don't tell you what you have to include 

among those things. That's up to you to determine what's 

appropriate for your system based on your evaluation of risk.

DOCTOR JULIE GAUTHIER: I like your analogy, Tim. It's 

making me a little hungry. Carol, from your perspective, how did 

the 14 principles come to be?

CAROL CARDONA: Well, none of these principles are 

really new with this particular part of NPIP. Many of them are 

included in other programs, like the salmonella program or the 

mycoplasma program. These principles are well established. 

But my perspective, you know, I completely agree with Tim on 
this, as to where they actually arose, how they arose. But I think 

when I look at them, I think that they really represent parts of 

pathways. 

So, if we look at, for example, an avian influenza, we might 

say wild birds would be the reservoir host or a good source of 

avian influenza virus, so we can see that we have this number 6 

as a listing of wild birds and something that we should have a wild 

bird control program or exclusion program. And wild birds would, 

the pathway might be that they could contaminate, come to your 

farm, and eat spilled feed in your perimeter buffer area, that would 

be next to the barn, for example. So, you can see that perimeter 

buffer area control is part of the, is also part of one of the 

principles, number 4. And then you can see that someone would 

have to walk through that contamination fecal material from wild 

birds on the ground and walk into your barn exposing your turkeys 

or chickens. And so, you can see the line of separation is also a 

principle, number three. 

So, these principles to me represent the various component 

parts of pathways for how avian influenza or other pathogens 

might make their way into, onto a farm and into a barn, and thus 

expose the birds. And so, if any one of these is mitigated, you 

reduce your chances of being exposed. And if all of those 

component parts are addressed, you reduce your risk of infection 

even more.

DOCTOR JULIE GAUTHIER: These principles seem to be 

good common sense. How do we know they work to prevent 
spread of avian influenza from farm to farm? Tim, what's the 

evidence?

TIM BOYER: There's been a lot of work and research 

providing evidence of the effectiveness of biosecurity. There is a 

number of epidemiologic studies of avian influenza infection with 

risk factors related to biosecurity or lack of biosecurity, it's difficult 

to quantify the effectiveness of biosecurity measures. I was 

looking at one interesting study recently that looked at the 

prevalence of diseases in small flocks in California, from that 

pretty high prevalence. But some biosecurity measures like 

dedicated footwear and sourcing birds from hatcheries that are 

NPIP compliant were associated with lower prevalence of some of 

the pathogens, that's just one example that biosecurity can 

reduce the risk.

DOCTOR JULIE GAUTHIER: Carol, what else do you have 

that these principles work?

>> I would go to the risk assessments and the secure poultry 

supply plan give you a lot of good evidence, hundreds of pages,

and hundreds of references of evidence. But in addition to that, 

we use those citations, we add to that expert interviews, we work 

with the industry to talk to them about their experiences with 

biosecurity, and then we use those mitigation measures, and we 

model what those mitigation outcomes might be in disease 

transmission. And we see that the flow or the exposure, the 

movement of infection on the transmission of infection of avian 

influenza can be stopped by the implementation of specific types 
of mitigations, because as I said before, it interrupts a pathway. 

Then we write a guidance about that, and you can -- and then, 

because we have written those guidances, the industry in 

outbreaks have put those into use in cooperation with their state 

permitting authorities. And so, we know that they work because 

we have seen that product and animals can be moved from not 

known to be infected premises using this guidance because those 

principles work.

DOCTOR JULIE GAUTHIER: Thanks. Let's move on to 

the next slide. And talk about all the biosecurity principles, how 

they were developed with avian influenza prevention in mind. It 

covers more than just avian influenza. There are other, maybe 

more common infectious diseases, that cause serious problems 

for poultry, such as infectious bronchitis, and -- causing a 

discharge and respiratory distress in the center image, or 

Newcastle disease which can cause the nervous systems signs 

that you see in the image at the bottom. I should point out that 

avian influenza can cause anomalies, respiratory signs 

and -- signs and it's not possible to determine the cause without 

tests. 

Tim, how well do the principles apply to preventing other 

diseases besides avian influenza?

>> The principles are designed for keeping pathogens out in 

general, not just avian influenza, that just happens to be a 

challenging pathogen. For example, having measures in place to 

establish a perimeter buffer area, having procedures for vehicles 
and people entering the perimeter buffer area, that should help 

reduce the risk of avian influenza and other pathogens that persist 

in the environment and can be spread by fomites. Another is 

sourcing birds from flocks that are monitored for poultry 

pathogens according to NPIP guidelines, that will reduce the risk 

of introducing a number of pathogens to that particular pathway.

>> So, the biosecurity principles are clearly not just for avian 

influenza. And in what ways does biosecurity contribute to 

raising healthy poultry in generally Carol?

CAROL CARDONA: There are some other good examples

that you have to think about, obviously avian influenza is not the 

only concern, as you have pointed out. Salmonella is a big food 

safety concern and can also be a major poultry pathogen. We 

know that avian influenza has reservoir host in wild aquatic birds, 

while salmonella has reservoir host in rodents. So rodent control 

is part of the NPIP plans. In addition, getting your poultry from 

known sources is another biosecurity principle that helps to 

prevent the vertical transmission of Salmonella to pults or chicks. 

In addition, I just want to point out that biosecurity not only helps 

to limit the spread of the things we can't see, it also can limit the 

spread of things that we can see. So many of our listeners are 

probably well familiar with the fact that people tend to build 

houses next to poultry farms or might build houses or live near 

places where people have small poultry flocks. And the dogs, 

cats, all kinds of wandering people can also come on to a poultry 

farm and cause damage. Dogs in particular can prey on chicken 
flocks and cause a lot of damage. Biosecurity is not just for the 

things you can't see, also the things that you can.

DOCTOR JULIE GAUTHIER: That's an excellent point and 

on the next slide, we will talk about how the biosecurity plan is 

meant to be site specific. And it takes into consideration the 

physical layout of the farm and how it's managed. There are so 

many options for biosecurity measures, they can vary greatly in 

cost and difficulty in implementing them. So, among all those 

options, how should a producer decide which measures to put in 

place on a particular farm, and what should a producer focus on? 

Tim, would you talk about how a producer can choose from the 

menu of options?

TIM BOYER: Well, like you said, it depends on the 

specifics of the farm characteristics. What might be right for one 

farm might not be for the other, the whole point of creating a 

biosecurity plan is to evaluate and manage risks. These 14 

principles are methods for reducing the risks. I guess I would 

start by thinking about what's my biggest concern. What am I 

doing now for biosecurity? How do my current practices fit into 

these 14 principles? And how is my current biosecurity 

mitigating the risks of the biggest concern? Can I identify any 

gaps or reasonable measures that would be acceptable to me 

and my workers that are sustainable that would help close those 

gaps? For example, are the PPE requirements and procedures 

for my site, are they adequate? How about for non-farm 

personnel? How about for non-farm personnel, are there 
changes that we can make to those requirements that will reduce 

my risk of disease on my farm? The nice thing about these 14 

principles is that they allow you to tackle things in bite size pieces 

so you don't get overwhelmed with thinking about all the ways 

that disease could enter your farm.

DOCTOR JULIE GAUTHIER: Carol, what is your advice 

about selecting appropriate measures?

>> I like all the things that Tim said. And I completely 

agree. I think, you know, acceptable to workers and feasible are 

really, really critical, and I just want to point out the picture here is 

something that, you know, we have often thought, or we have, in 

the past, supported this kind of boot dip approach. So, this is an 

iodine foot bath. Iodine is, requires about at least 30 seconds to 

kill about 80 percent of the viruses and bacteria that you might 

step into, that you might have on your boots and might not want to 

track into your poultry house, well 80 percent are not good 

enough for most people. You really have to stand in that iodine 

foot bath for a good minute if not more. If you think that's simple 

and easy, just try standing in a bucket of water and see how well 

your mind doesn't wander and you don't think about other things, 

and you don't wish like heck you could get out of that bucket. It's 

not a particularly good barrier. So, I just want to point that out. 

And I think most of our poultry industry has gone away from using 

this as a sole barrier to, for footwear. So, you hear people talking 

about changing boots or using barn specific boots, which is a 

much more feasible and much more acceptable way to introduce 
workers to the Line of Separation strategies.

DOCTOR JULIE GAUTHIER: That gets me thinking about 

what other biosecurity measures might seem to make a lot of 

sense, like a foot bath. But haven't really turned out to be worth 

it. Tim, can you think of any examples of biosecurity measures 

that just might not be worth it?

TIM BOYER: Well, the main one that comes to mind for me 

is the one that Carol just discussed, that's foot baths. Along with 

the soaking time required, the solution that you use needs to be 

fresh and changed frequently. There should be no organic 

material on your boots for it to be able to do its job. So, if you are 

not going to do those things consistently, then that measure might 

not be worth it? It could even do more harm than good. So, the 

measures that aren't worth it are the ones you are not going to do 

or not going to do correctly. 

DOCTOR JULIE GAUTHIER: Good points. Carol, would 

you like to add to that discussion of items that might not be worth 

introducing in your plan?

CAROL CARDONA: I guess one of mine is signs. A lot of 

times we put up a sign outside of the farm to say stop, don't enter. 

And very, very often they are in English, and whereas the most 

likely person to enter your farm might be Spanish speaking or 

might speak some other language. So, it's important to have 

your signs in probably multiple languages. In addition, I really 

frankly don't read signs very well if I go through the same door 

every day.
So, I think it's important to kind of change those up. If you 

really want people to pay attention, you have got to think about 

moving the signs, changing their shape, adding color, whatever it 

is. So, when things are, you know, that is something that you 

potentially could do if things, if you are in a dangerous time, really 

think about freshening up your signs and making them surprising 

to the people who see them every day. And get workers and 

visitors and everybody else engaged.

DOCTOR JULIE GAUTHIER: Good tips. The next slide 

let’s move on to talking about risk factors for introducing avian 

influenza to a poultry farm. And you provided this chart, Carol. I 

found it very helpful to illustrate the importance of the different 

categories of biosecurity measures. Could you describe the 

chart and tell me what -- what does the size of the pie pieces 

indicate?

CAROL CARDONA: This chart is derived from a risk 

assessment, and actually it summarizes multiple risk

assessments. And it's the mitigation measures that provide the 

greatest impact on transmission. So, we are turning our risk 

assessment inside out and making it into a biosecurity sort of 

weighted chart. So, the size of the pie chart indicates the 

amount of impact that that measure had on preventing the 

transmission of infection.

So, for example, if we look at the strict line of separation 

enforcement with PPE, that had, that was, I think 22 percent 

impact -- or, no, 15 percent impact on our, on the spread of 
infection. Whereas feed truck restrictions had less than 

5 percent impact on the transmission of avian influenza.

>> Tim, can you comment about how well these categories

align with the risk factors identified in your research, and can you 

tell us how some of these categories are related and might 

overlap?

TIM BOYER: Yeah, many of these categories have been 

identified as risk factors in the epidemiologic work that we have 

done here over the past several years. There's some overlap 

between those different outbreaks, but they also each identified 

risk factors unique to each situation in that reflects that that risk is 

contact specific. It can vary according to the type of production 

system, the part of the country where the farms are located, the 

virus strain. But a lot of risk factors identified in those studies, 

they fall under perimeter buffer area enforcement, since that's the 

first line of defense. Multiple studies have identified vehicles 

or personnel coming close to the barns that haven’t followed bio 

secure entry procedures, factors related to strict line separation 

have been identified, things like having a hard surface entry pad 

that is clean and disinfected has been found to be protective and 

an expert study found barn enclosure defects as a risk factor

which also falls under that category and that study also identified 

shared equipment and vehicles, inadequate visitor restrictions, so 

procedures have been identified. Downtime for employees, bird 

proof confinement have come up in some studies and bio secure 

dead bird disposal has been identified multiple times as has bio 
secure garbage management. Some of these things that come 

up repeatedly and relates to where the virus is on the farm. It’s in 

infected birds, it is in dead birds and some of these things that 

come up repeatedly are related to business operations that have 

to happen and can't go away completely, you can't keep everyone 

out of the barn, but you can do things to mitigate these factors 

and reduce the risk of disease coming on to your farm. And 

these are not all independent from each other, bio secure dead 

bird disposal, truck and driver biosecurity, visitor restrictions, they 

all fall under strict perimeter buffer area enforcement, bird proof 

confinement, and showering and changing clothes those fall 

under strict Line of Separation enforcement with PPE. So, if you 

have strict perimeter buffer area enforcement, entry is limited to 

clearly identified access points, marked with signs non-essential 

vehicles aren't entering into the perimeter buffer area, employees, 

visitors, truck drivers service personnel are trained and screened 

and understand the procedures to follow entering that area, you

really are addressing multiple risk categories.

DOCTOR JULIE GAUTHIER: So, let's dig a bit more into 

research and talk about what did we learn from the largest U.S. 

outbreak of avian influenza back in 2015, and tell us about the 

differences between farms that became infected and those that 

didn’t?

TIM BOYER: During that outbreak, APHIS conducted what 

they call a case-controlled study during that outbreak where they 

interviewed participants where from infected premises and from 
non-infected premises that were in the same geographic area. 

They asked many, many questions related to premises 

characteristics, farm and barn infrastructure, environmental 

factors, like wildlife, things related to service personnel and 

vehicle and equipment. Other barn level and farm level 

biosecurity procedures, and what they found was that rendering

trucks and garbage trucks coming near barns and company 

service personnel visiting in the previous 14 days were risk 

factors for disease spread. Having visitors change clothes was 

protective, and that may be an indicator of just generally 

heightened attention to human cause risk pathways, because the 

required change of clothing are more likely to require other visitor 

related action. The most important risk factor was being located

within 10 kilometers of an infected premises in the study and that 

gets to the height and risk of where HPI is known to be in the area 

and the need to be especially diligent about biosecurity in those

situations. So those were the biggest ones that showed up in the 

final statistical analysis, there were a lot of interesting results in 

the study that describe differences in biosecurity practices 

between the case and the control farms. Those can help inform 

biosecurity planning, for example, a much higher percentage of 

control farms had hard surface entry pads that were cleaned and 

disinfected than case farms. And one counter intuitive result was 

in there was the higher percentage, more than twice as many 

than the case farms to the control farms. Sometimes weird 

results like that lead to new insights. So, was it something 
related to the shower issue, was it a compliance issue? But you 

know showering in your biosecurity plan is one thing, but actually 

doing it is another.

DOCTOR JULIE GAUTHIER: That's an excellent point. 

Carol, what do you consider to be the important lessons that we 

learned from studying, we went from studying the 2015 outbreak?

CAROL CARDONA: Well, I think it's important to remember 

that this was about the 2015 outbreak. So, you know, I guess I 

would ask Tim about why, how this might, you know, if he thinks 

this would apply to the next outbreak. We don't know when or 

where that would happen. Do you think it would?

TIM BOYER: Well, no, I think it's the reason why we keep 

doing epidemiologic investigations every time there's a high path 

avian influenza outbreak. Sometimes the situations can be 

different with every outbreak and every virus, we do see overlap. 

We do see some risk factors that come up repeatedly, and others 

tend to be unique to particular outbreaks. Some of these things 

we saw in this case control study from 2015. Maybe wouldn't be 

totally relevant in the next outbreak. This case control study took 

place only in -- operations, so would apply to other production 

types and for outbreaks that happen in other parts of the country. 

I think there are some messages in there that are pretty 

fundamental and would apply generally, and other things that 

maybe wouldn't.

DOCTOR JULIE GAUTHIER: So, the next slide, we have 

got a -- I pulled down a few other pie pieces because this was 
striking to me. These four measures on the right-hand side of 

the pie, they can control -- you deal with these, you control nearly 

half of the risk to the flock. Carol, what is your message to 

producers about that half of this pie?

CAROL CARDONA: I think you are exactly right, Julie. I 

think the importance of these four measures are that they really 

do represent sort of the first line of defense, the perimeter buffer 

area, and the last line of defense, the strict line of separation 

enforcement. And those two, you know, along with the other 

four -- the other -- these four criteria are also controlled by the 

producer at the local level, by the farmer, the rancher, that every, 

you know, the person who is on the farm can control these things, 

these are not things that come from outside of his control. So 

wild birds, you know, rodents, these are all things that he can 

control, and therefore, can -- are best, some of our best defenses 

against disease.

DOCTOR JULIE GAUTHIER: Tim, will you comment about 

the importance of addressing these four areas of concern?

TIM BOYER: Well, perimeter buffer area is the first line of 

defense, and the Line of Separation is the last line of defense. 

We have already talked about how they can overlap and include a 

lot of other risk factors, so they are very important. Visitors can 

potentially be -- vulnerability if they don't understand or follow 

biosecurity procedures, and equipment can serve as a means of 

disease spread. When you have measures in place to restrict 

shares as much as possible and correct other procedures.
DOCTOR JULIE GAUTHIER: The next slide, we have been 

talking mostly about everyday biosecurity. So, let's turn the 

conversation to riskier times and places. The risk of avian 

influenza introduction increases at a time when wild birds carrying 

influenza congregate near poultry farms that share services with 

other farms is infected. 

I will ask you first, Carol, what is the difference between 

biosecurity in peace time when no detections have been made? 

CAROL CARDONA: The difference is the amount of virus 

that's out there. If you think about normal times, maybe you 

have a hundred virus particles that are on your person and could 

make it across your biosecurity mitigations. If you are 99 percent 

effective, then what -- you might be able -- one single variant 

might make it through. And that's not enough to infect the bird.

On the other hand, if you have a hundred billion virus 

particles in the environment and on the person that might be 

coming through your Danish entry, and they are 99 percent 

effective in eliminating those, you still have a billion virus particles 

that can make it into the farm. And that's certainly enough to 

infect a flock of birds. The risk is about the amounts of virus 

that's out there or the amount of bacteria that's out there and 

therefore the need for precision and more effective measures at 

eliminating those virus particles. I just want to mention here 

something from the previous slide on showers. You might think 

about including showers at a time when things are really risky. 

And they can be very effective, although Doctor Boyer's study 
shows that they were counter intuitively not as effective. And I 

think when you do take on showers, they have the potential to 

really help, but you have got to take a big bite and really make 

sure you are including scheduling, including people to take care of 

the showers. You make sure that you have enough shower 

capacity to handle surges in people, so when crews come 

through, you have got a lot more people coming on to a farm or 

into a barn than you do in normal times. All of those things, I 

think, you have to go and look at your biosecurity system and 

make sure that you have considered the contingencies that can 

cause breakdown, and that's especially true with showers.

DOCTOR JULIE GAUTHIER: Tim, what do you think?

TIM BOYER: Those are great. I think the 14 biosecurity 

principles are meant to apply to poultry facilities during 

routine operations during peace time, as you said, and they are 

aimed at mitigating the common pathogens. During high-risk

times, they would really need to be reevaluated, making sure you 

are doing what you say you are going to do and think about 

maybe additional things that need to be done during high-risk

times. Along with those things, there may be heightened 

measures, target on certain pathways, but the virus can get into 

an affected farm during outbreak. If it's circulated and you find 

yourself in an affected zone, because you are close by to an 

infected premises, there are other things that you might be 

required to do to obtain a movement permit. There's a measure 

called the pre movement isolation period, that's a period of time 
when there's heightened biosecurity and only critical operations 

are allowed onsite. During normal times your plan may have 

requirement for vaccination crews that will wear boots and clothes 

and properly cross the Line of Separation. During the 

premovement isolation period, no crews would be allowed to visit 

the farm for at least five days prior to movement. So, its revisiting 

and reevaluating your biosecurity plan and considering things that 

might need to be done differently during periods of risk. 

DOCTOR JULIE GAUTHIER: Thanks. Let's move on 

to -- we touched on compliance a couple of times, and the next 

slide, let's get into that in more detail. How well everyone who 

enters the farm sticks to the rules of the biosecurity plan, and 

research has shown that people carry out biosecurity measures in 

the papers that I have seen, and this accounts for poultry

premises even hospitals that people carrying out the biosecurity 

measures generally do it right about half the time, maybe less. 

So, what are the ways that have been shown to be helpful in 

increasing compliance with biosecurity measures making sure 

that everyone on the farm follows the rules all the time, Tim?

TIM BOYER: Compliance is tough. Biosecurity can be 

inconvenient. There is some research that shows that 

observation, things like presence of a visible camera at a barn 

entrance can help improve compliance over the short term, but 

that compliance still declined over time, even with that measure 

present.

I think it really just comes down to developing a culture 
within your production system that involves education, repeated 

education, revisiting these concepts with your employees, 

because employee turnover is an issue. And gaining employee 

buy in. Compliance depends on understanding in describing why 

these procedures are important and making sure your employees 

really get that. And doing things to minimize inconvenience, 

things like providing choices for footwear and clothing and 

emphasize comforts and safety, if you are requiring showering, 

having clean showers and a nice environment for doing that, can 

help. Getting feedback on what is happening versus what is 

written in your biosecurity plan is what is important, what is 

happening is anonymous for getting feedback needed. Making 

sure that you are consistent, and everybody is following the same 

procedures, your visitors, contractors, the employees, the 

managers, everybody should be doing the same thing to get a 

culture of biosecurity.

DOCTOR JULIE GAUTHIER: And Carol, would you like to 

weigh in on that? How can we increase compliance?

CAROL CARDONA: Yeah, I agree with Tim. I think I 

would add, you know, an audit, especially an educational audit 

where someone can come out and look at your farm and see 

where the problems might be. This -- in this barn, in this picture 

is clearly a problem. But my guess is lots of people have seen 

this and have walked right past it, because they have gotten used 

to it. Sometimes someone who is an outsider can provide really 

good, pointed comments about what you are not seeing anymore. 
And I think that's always important. And then I would agree, I 

think the most important reason for a lack of compliance is really 

that people, you know, call it cognitive dissonance, but seeing the 

veterinarian come to the farm, this person in authority with 

knowledge, not entering the barn following the same procedures 

that workers are asked to follow, or the owner of the farm or 

anyone else. Every single person who comes on that farm has 

to follow the same procedure. One of the better ways to do that 

is making sure that someone who is new to the farm is always 

followed. There should be an escort for that person to help them 

through the biosecurity -- those things like Line of Separation 

procedures.

DOCTOR JULIE GAUTHIER: Thanks. And next slide, 

please. Where can producers go to get help in assessing their 

site-specific risks? Where would you point people, Tim, for 

information on building their plan and trying to encourage people 

to be compliant with it?

TIM BOYER: There are some great suggestions on the 

slide here, University of Minnesota extension has a lot of useful 

videos and other resources to help develop your plan and the 

National Poultry Improvement Plan website has detailed 

information on the 14 biosecurity principles. Also, the Centers for 

Food Safety and Public Health at Iowa State University has a lot 

of resources including templates for creating a biosecurity plan. 

Those things are all focused on the plan and how to create it. 

But an important step before that is the risk assessment piece. 
You should spend some time looking, and with some local 

resources, maybe a veterinarian, someone else in your area who 

has expertise in biosecurity, like Carol mentioned, having an 

objective set of eyes looking at your operation and observe, 

assess it and evaluate what's the risks, what's the layout of your 

operation, where the traffic flows of people and vehicles, where 

are the things like dead bird disposal, things like that, how are 

they placed relative to the barns?

Who are your closest neighbors? How many other poultry 

operations are nearby? Is there open water, forest, wild birds, or 

other wildlife you see on your property at different times of the 

year? Thinking about assessing those risks and the potential

pathways of diseases and destruction and having someone look 

at that with an objective set of eyes with you will go a long way in 

helping you put those other resources that were mentioned to use 

to build a good biosecurity plan.

DOCTOR JULIE GAUTHIER: Carol, you and your team 

have quite a bit of experience teaching adults. What sources are 

available to develop effective training plans? Do you have any 

tips on how to train workers properly?

CAROL CARDONA: It's always, it's a very, very tough, and 

very good question. I think every poultry manager, or really a

people manager needs to think about that question. You know, 

just as Tim has advocated for taking a look at your site to see 

what risks are present on your site, your workforce is a specific 

group of people with a specific set of characteristics that you have 
to consider when you are training them. And, you know, when 

you oftentimes I see with training that we tell somebody 

something, and we automatically assume that they are going to 

absorb that and go do what we suggested.

And that's very, very rarely the case.

Adults take, you know, go through several steps before they 

actually will take something on and do the action that they need to 

do. That is certainly what we have to get to if biosecurity is going 

to be effective.

So, one of the things I think we should always look for is, are 

there opportunities to take, make our operational biosecurity 

structural. Are there ways that we can force people to go 

through the right door, if that's the issue? Are there ways that we 

can keep people from not crossing little Line of Separation 

properly, if there's a side door on the barn that people tend to 

sneak back into the barn through, maybe you can lock that door 

or take the handle off the outside or something, to keep them from 

coming in that way.

But another thing is, I think you always have to consider 

what your final step is, your final step is the action. You really 

have to observe that. Are people doing what you have asked? 

If not, review your program and see where they are breaking 

down. Talk to them and see if you can get feedback on what has 

gone wrong. But I will remind you that it's often difficult for 

Hispanic to get those answers from Hispanic workers who tend to 

have a great deal of respect and/or fear of authority. So, it takes 
some relationships, and it takes some time to get the answers 

that you really need. But my advice would be observe and 

evaluate what you observe.

DOCTOR JULIE GAUTHIER: Thanks so much, Tim, and 

Carol. I really appreciate your wisdom and advice that you have 

provided. I learned a lot during our sessions together. I will 

move on to the next few slides to give you an overview of the 

resources available through USDA APHIS that will help you

prepare for future disease outbreaks and make biosecurity an

everyday practice. APHIS has developed a library of checklists; 

these provide practical tips and recommendations. We 

encourage you to visit the Defend the Flock website to view and 

download these materials. All of the checklists are available in 

multiple languages, including Spanish, Chinese, Vietnamese, and 

Tagalog. On our website you will find lots of other free tools 

including videos, recordings of prior webinars, info cards

newsletters, posters, and other resources. 

APHIS has also created social media content to help 

promote biosecurity. Infographics cover many of the best 

practices. We hope that you will share these with your 

colleagues, and fellow poultry keepers, you can share them on 

Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram, and other measures to make 

sure they are using them every time no matter the size of the 

flock.

Earlier this month, APHIS launched an all-Spanish language 

resource page. Now all resources can be found in one place. 
Users will be able to download Spanish checklists, social graphics 

and much more. APHIS recently expanded the Defend the Flock 

biosecurity awareness campaign to include outreach to new and 

young poultry producers. The #FlockDefender program offers 

the next generation of poultry keepers with youth-oriented 

educational poultry care content. This is aimed at increasing 

awareness and adoption of best practices in biosecurity.

Be sure to check out more helpful information on your social 

media channels. This presentation along with answers to your 

questions will be available for download from the Defend the 

Flock website shortly. Be sure to follow the Defend the Flock on 

the Facebook and Twitter to be notified when the presentation is 

available.

And before we go, on behalf of APHIS, thank you so much to 

Tim and Carol for sharing your valuable insights and knowledge 

with us today. Thanks to all of you for joining us on this webinar. 

Let's keep our poultry healthy together.