Weekly Overview:
13 September 2012
ANALYSIS - With no new outbreaks of H7N3 bird flu reported in Mexico for the last three weeks, the poultry industry there must be holding its breath and hoping that the crisis is over. In the last week, it has been reported that the cost of the outbreaks, which mainly affected the egg industry, has been estimated at the equivalent of around US$860 million, the lives of more than 22 million poultry that either died or had to be culled and upwards of 7,500 jobs.
H7N3 highly pathogenic avian influenza broke out in Mexico's top egg-producing state, Jalisco, in late June. Since that first outbreak, ThePoultrySite has been following developments, which have included major disruptions to the egg market in this country that is among the leading egg-consuming countries of the world. Egg prices to consumers rose on fears of tight supplies and the country was forced to import significant quantities of eggs for the first time, mainly from the US and under a quota system.
