As America gears up for the year's end and a change in administration, the topic of public health has dominated many conversations throughout the election season, but one facet has been noticeably absent: bird flu. Human infections of the H5N1 virus have sharply risen in the last few weeks, alarming many public health experts are wondering — and worried — what this means for another possible pandemic like COVID-19.

This week, public health officials detected bird flu in a sample of raw milk sold in California. According to a press release by the California Department of Public Health, the public is being advised to avoid consuming “one batch of cream top, whole raw milk” produced by the brand Raw Farm. The news comes after public health experts have warned that drinking or accidentally inhaling raw milk containing the bird flu virus may lead to illness.

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It also comes at a time as the country’s incoming Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. continues to promote the consumption of raw milk. Just this past summer, Kennedy bragged to an audience at an event that he only drinks raw milk, and more recently, claimed the Food and Drug Administration’s so-called “war on public health” includes “suppression” of raw milk.

The bird flu crisis began several years ago but ramped up last April when dairy cows started becoming infected. Since then, 55 human cases have been reported across several states, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Most of these infections occurred in farmworkers who came into contact with infected cows or poultry, with the exception of three cases that are mystifying health officials. The first is a case in Missouri in which health officials have yet to track the origins of the infection. The second is a Canadian teenager who has remained hospitalized in critical condition with bird flu, again........

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