Nearly 1 million chickens killed at egg farm as nation’s largest bird flu outbreak grows– www.independent.co.uk

Nearly 1 million chickens were killed at an Illinois farm after a bird flu outbreak became the nation’s largest active outbreak this week.

The outbreak affected 934,600 birds at a commercial table egg layer facility in Clinton County, Illinois, the United States Department of Agriculture confirmed. It reportedly occurred at Rose Acre Farms, located outside Germantown, village officials told KSDK.

Rose Acre Farms is the second-largest egg producer in the U.S., according to the company’s website. With no treatment available for highly pathogenic avian influenza, better known as bird flu, authorities must kill infected and exposed birds to contain the virus.

Losing nearly a million hens could disrupt egg production and put further pressure on prices as supplies tighten.

The scale of the Illinois outbreak far exceeds other active cases nationwide. Minnesota had the next-highest number of birds affected, with 168,880 statewide, according to the USDA.