OSTRICH FARM Dr. Byram Bridle
Here are the blunt facts: Canadian Food Inspection Agency did not want to risk the massive embarrassment of proving that they were executing avian influenza virus-free ostriches.

The data suggest the ostriches experienced an outbreak of avian influenza, which was most likely introduced to the farm by wild birds, in which the virus is endemic. In the ostriches, the virus functionally behaved like a low pathogenic strain, based on the percentage of deaths.

Ostriches that had been on the farm for more than several years did not get sick, suggesting that they had naturally acquired immunity, likely from a previous exposure to the virus. Newer members of the flock got sick and some died.
Most of the sick ostriches recovered and returned to full health. This suggests that all of the remaining healthy flock had naturally acquired immunity. So, to execute healthy birds with gold-standard immunity in no way increases the safety of people or animals in the region.
In fact, it does the opposite.

A huge question in this case is why was the Canadian Food Inspection Agency so averse to testing the ostriches, especially after they had been so obviously healthy for so long? This was all done based on two sets of PCR tests from almost one year ago. Any new testing by the farmers themselves carried the threat of massive fines and even jail time! One can only assume that the Canadian Food Inspection Agency did not want to risk the massive embarrassment of proving that they were executing avian influenza virus-free ostriches.
Full article here:
viralimmunologist.substack.com/p/the-canadian… They attempted to get in to test the birds, willing to face the 200K fine, but the RCMP stopped them.

Universal Ostrich Farm - How the Biggest Birds on Earth Could Help Fend Off Epidemics
Background Japan: Since he was a child, Yasuhiro Tsukamoto had wanted to do research on dinosaurs and birds. Ostriches, he determined, were the best middle ground. “They have fingers and nails on the inside of their feathers, which makes them very primitive and near dinosaurs,” Tsukamoto writes.

Now, as a dean in veterinary science at Japan’s Kyoto Prefecture University, he gets to work with the giant dino-birds every day while harnessing their heavyweight properties to fight human afflictions.
Thread 🧵 II Tsukamoto keeps a flock of 500 captive-bred Ostriches at four sprawling ranches in central Japan. He was originally tasked to study them for a project in which the birds were fed surplus soy beans, which they would then poop into fertilizer for local farms. But that all changed in the early 1990s when he noticed his charges were surprisingly disease-free compared to other captive species. This high level of immunity, he and his colleagues soon gathered, could be traced back to the hefty five-pound eggs the birds made.