Texas Tribune
How bird flu cases were linked to Texas cattle
by By Amy Maxmen, KFF Health News, The Texas Tribune – 2024-05-23 05:00:00
SUMMARY: In the Texas Panhandle, an outbreak of the highly pathogenic bird flu strain H5N1 affected dairy cattle, with symptoms initially unnoticed. The virus, which spread to at least eight states, was particularly unexpected in cows, complicating early detection and response. Advanced technology on farms monitored cow health, revealing sudden illness patterns. Despite extensive testing, H5N1 was overlooked due to its rarity in cattle. The spread, likely from migratory birds, highlights significant risks and calls for better collaboration and research. Federal restrictions and aid have sparked mixed reactions among farmers, underscoring the complexities in managing such outbreaks.
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In early February, dairy farmers in the Texas Panhandle began to notice sick cattle. The buzz soon reached Darren Turley, executive director of the Texas Association of Dairymen: “They said there is something moving from herd to herd.”
Nearly 60 days passed before veterinarians identified the culprit: a highly pathogenic strain of the bird flu virus, H5N1. Had it been detected sooner, the outbreak might have been swiftly contained. Now it has spread to at least eight other states, and it will be hard to eliminate.
At the moment, the bird flu hasn't adapted to spread from person to person through the air like the seasonal flu. That's what it would take to give liftoff to another pandemic. This lucky fact could change, however, as the virus mutates within each cow it infects. Those mutations are random, but more cows provide more chances of stumbling on ones that pose a grave risk to humans.
Why did it take so long to recognize the virus on high-tech farms in the world's richest country? Because even though H5N1 has circulated for nearly three decades, its arrival in dairy cattle was most unexpected. “People tend to think that an outbreak starts at Monday at 9 a.m. with a sign saying, ‘Outbreak has started,'” said Jeremy Farrar, chief scientist at the World Health Organization. “It's rarely like that.”
By investigating the origins of outbreaks, researchers garner clues about how they start and spread. That information can curb the toll of an epidemic and, ideally, stop the next one. On-the-ground observations and genomic analyses point to Texas as ground zero for this outbreak in cattle. To backtrack events in Texas, KFF Health News spoke with more than a dozen people, including veterinarians, farmers, and state officials.
An early indication that something had gone awry on farms in northwestern Texas came from devices hitched to collars on dairy cows. Turley describes them as “an advanced fitness tracker.” They collect a stream of data, such as a cow's temperature, its milk quality, and the progress of its digestion — or, rather, rumination — within its four-chambered stomach.
What farmers saw when they downloaded the data in February stopped them in their tracks. One moment a cow seemed perfectly fine, and then four hours later, rumination had halted. “Shortly after the stomach stops, you'd see a huge falloff in milk,” Turley said. “That is not normal.”
Tests for contagious diseases known to whip through herds came up negative. Some farmers wondered if the illness was related to ash from wildfires devastating land to the east.
In hindsight, Turley wished he had made more of the migrating geese that congregate in the panhandle each winter and spring. Geese and other waterfowl have carried H5N1 around the globe. They withstand enormous loads of the virus without getting sick, passing it on to local species, like blackbirds, cowbirds, and grackles, that mix with migrating flocks.
But with so many other issues facing dairy farmers, geese didn't register. “One thing you learn in agriculture is that Mother Nature is unpredictable and can be devastating,” Turley said. “Just when you think you have figured it out, Mother Nature tells you you do not.”
Cat Clues
One dairy tried to wall itself off, careful not to share equipment with or employ the same workers as other farms, Turley recalled. Its cattle still became ill. Turley noted that the farm was downwind of another with an outbreak, “so you almost think it has to have an airborne factor.”
On March 7, Turley called the Texas Animal Health Commission. They convened a One Health group with experts in animal health, human health, and agriculture to ponder what they called the “mystery syndrome.” State veterinarians probed cow tissue for parasites, examined the animals' blood, and tested for viruses and bacteria. But nothing explained the sickness.
They didn't probe for H5N1. While it has jumped into mammals dozens of times, it rarely has spread between species. Most cases have been in carnivores, which likely ate infected birds. Cows are mainly vegetarian.
“If someone told me about a milk drop in cows, I wouldn't think to test for H5N1 because, no, cattle don't get that,” said Thomas Peacock, a virologist at the Pirbright Institute of England who studies avian influenza.
Postmortem tests of grackles, blackbirds, and other birds found dead on dairy farms detected H5N1, but that didn't turn the tide. “We didn't think much of it since we have seen H5N1-positive birds everywhere in the country,” said Amy Swinford, director of the Texas A&M Veterinary Medical Diagnostic Laboratory.
In the meantime, rumors swirled about a rash of illness among workers at dairy farms in the Panhandle. It was flu season, however, and hospitals weren't reporting anything out of the ordinary.
Bethany Boggess Alcauter, director of research at the National Center for Farmworker Health, has worked in the panhandle and suspected farmworkers were unlikely to see a doctor even if they needed one. Clinics are far from where they live, she said, and many don't speak English or Spanish — for instance, they may speak Indigenous languages such as Mixtec, which is common in parts of Mexico. The cost of medical care is another deterrent, along with losing pay by missing work — or losing their jobs — if they don't show up. “Even when medical care is there,” she said, “it's a challenge.”
What finally tipped off veterinarians? A few farm cats died suddenly and tested positive for H5N1. Swinford's group — collaborating with veterinary labs at Iowa State and Cornell universities — searched for the virus in samples drawn from sick cows.
“On a Friday night at 9 p.m., March 22, I got a call from Iowa State,” Swinford said. Researchers had discovered antibodies against H5N1 in a slice of a mammary gland. By Monday, her team and Cornell researchers identified genetic fragments of the virus. They alerted authorities. With that, the U.S. Department of Agriculture announced that H5N1 had hit dairy cattle.
Recalling rumors of sick farmworkers, Texas health officials asked farmers, veterinarians, and local health departments to encourage testing. About 20 people with coughs, aches, irritated eyes, or other flu-like symptoms stepped forward to be swabbed. Those samples were shipped to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. All but one was negative for H5N1. On April 1, the CDC announced this year's first — and so far only — case: a farmworker with an inflamed eye that cleared up within days.
Thirteen dairy farms in the Panhandle had been affected, said Brian Bohl, director of field operations at the Texas Animal Health Commission. Farmers report that outbreaks among the herds last 30 to 45 days and most cows return to milking at their usual pace.
The observation hints that herds gain immunity, if temporarily. Indeed, early evidence shows that H5N1 triggers a protective antibody response in cattle, said Marie Culhane, a professor of veterinary population medicine at the University of Minnesota. Nonetheless, she and others remain uneasy because no one knows how the virus spreads, or what risk it poses to people working with cattle.
Although most cows recover, farmers said the outbreaks have disrupted their careful timing around when cattle milk, breed, and birth calves.
Farmers want answers that would come with further research, but the spirit of collaboration that existed in the first months of the Texas outbreak has fractured. Federal restrictions have triggered a backlash from farmers who find them unduly punishing, given that pasteurized milk and cooked beef from dairy cattle appear to pose no risk to consumers.
The rules, such as prohibiting infected cattle from interstate travel for 30 days, pose a problem for farmers who move pregnant cattle to farms that specialize in calving, to graze in states with gentler winters, and to return home for milking. “When the federal order came out, some producers said, ‘I'm going to quit testing,'” Bohl said.
In May, the USDA offered aid, such as up to $10,000 to test and treat infected cattle. “The financial incentives will help,” Turley said. But how much remains to be seen.
Federal authorities have pressed states to extract more intel from farms and farmworkers. Several veterinarians warn such pressure could fracture their relationships with farmers, stifling lines of communication.
Having fought epidemics around the world, Farrar cited examples of when strong-arm surveillance pushed outbreaks underground. During an early 2000s bird flu outbreak in Vietnam, farmers circumvented regulations by moving poultry at night, bribing inspection workers, and selling their goods through back channels. “Learning what drivers and fears exist among people is crucial,” Farrar said. “But we always seem to realize that at a later date.”
A powerful driver in the U.S.: Milk is a $60 billion industry. Public health is also bound to bump up against politics in Texas, a state so aggrieved by pandemic restrictions that lawmakers passed a bill last year barring health officials from recommending covid-19 vaccines.
Texas Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller said that when he heard that federal agents with the CDC and USDA were considering visits to farms — including those where farmers reported the cattle had recovered — he advised against it. “Send federal agents to dairy that's not sick?” he said. “That doesn't pass the smell test.”
From Texas to the Nation
Peacock said genomic analyses of H5N1 viruses point to Texas as ground zero for the cattle epidemic, emerging late last year.
“All of these little jigsaw puzzle pieces corroborate undetected circulation in Texas for some time,” said Peacock, an author on one report about the outbreak.
Evidence suggests that either a single cow was infected by viruses shed from birds — perhaps those geese, grackles, or blackbirds, he said. Or the virus spilled over from birds into cattle several times, with only a fraction of those moving from cow to cow.
Sometime in March, viruses appear to have hitched a ride to other states as cows were moved between farms. The limited genomic data available links the outbreak in Texas directly to others in New Mexico, Kansas, Ohio, North Carolina, and South Dakota. However, the routes are imprecise because the USDA hasn't attached dates and locations to data it releases.
Researchers don't want to be caught off guard again by the shape-shifting H5N1 virus, and that will require keeping tabs on humans. Most, if not all, of about 900 people diagnosed with H5N1 infections worldwide since 2003 acquired it from animals, rather than from humans, Farrar said. About half of those people died.
Occasional tests of sick farmworkers aren't sufficient, he said. Ideally, a system is set up to encourage farmworkers, their communities, and health care workers to be tested whenever the virus hits farms nearby.
“Health care worker infections are always a sign of human-to-human transmission,” Farrar said. “That's the approach you want to take — I am not saying it's easy.”
Disclosure: Texas Association of Dairymen has been a financial supporter of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in the Tribune's journalism. Find a complete list of them here.
KFF Health News is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues and is one of the core operating programs at KFF — the independent source for health policy research, polling, and journalism.
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The Texas Tribune is a nonprofit, nonpartisan media organization that informs Texans — and engages with them — about public policy, politics, government and statewide issues.
Texas Tribune
Former Southern Baptist leader Paul Pressler dead at 94
by By Robert Downen, The Texas Tribune – 2024-06-15 18:40:13
SUMMARY: Paul Pressler, a prominent Southern Baptist leader and Republican activist, passed away on June 7 at 94. Pressler played a key role in the Southern Baptist Convention's conservative resurgence, opposing homosexuality and aligning with the Republican Party. He faced numerous sexual abuse allegations, resulting in a confidential lawsuit settlement six months before his death. Pressler's contributions included influencing GOP politics, notably supporting figures like Ted Cruz. Despite his significant impact, his death received muted attention. Pressler's legacy was marred by the scandal that contributed to a broader investigation and reforms within the Southern Baptist Convention regarding sex abuse.
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Paul Pressler, the monumental Southern Baptist leader and Republican activist at the center of a massive sex abuse scandal, died on June 7. He was 94.
It's unclear what Pressler's cause of death was, but a funeral service was held for him Saturday in Houston. Pressler was one of the most influential, if lesser-known, evangelical figures of the last half-century, having co-led a movement in the Southern Baptist Convention that pushed the nation's second-largest faith group to adopt literal interpretations of the Bible, strongly condemn homosexuality and more closely align with the Republican Party.
His death came barely six months after he confidentially settled a high-profile lawsuit with a former member of his youth group who accused him of decades of rape. As part of the suit, at least six other men came forward alleging that they were abused or solicited for sex by Pressler in a string of incidents dating from 1978 to 2016. Pressler denied the allegations and was never criminally charged.
Monumental as Pressler's legacy was, his death was largely kept quiet until Saturday, when a Baptist outlet first reported on the memorial service. Last week, the Southern Baptist Convention held its annual meeting, and it does not appear that any leaders made any remarks about his passing.
Herman Paul Pressler III was born in Houston in 1930 and attended New Jersey's exclusive Phillips Exeter Academy before attending Princeton University. After graduating from Princeton in 1952, he attended the University of Texas at Austin's law school and, as a 27-year-old student, was elected to represent a Houston-based district in the Texas House. He was later appointed by Texas Gov. Dolph Briscoe to a powerful seat on Texas' 14th Court of Appeals, where he served for 14 years.
While on the bench, Pressler helped plot and lead the SBC's “conservative resurgence,” a 20-year power struggle in which Pressler and his allies drove more moderate Baptists from the denomination, successfully pushed for bans on female pastors and solidified white evangelical support for the Republican Party.
Pressler was also an early member of the Council For National Policy, a secretive network of powerful business, religious and media elites that has pushed the GOP toward deregulation and to further infuse their conservative Christian views into public life. In 1989, Pressler was nominated to lead the Office of Government Ethics under President George H.W. Bush, though his nomination was later withdrawn.
From 2000 and onward — and with the battle for the SBC won — Pressler increasingly focused on Republican Party politics. In 2007, Louisiana College announced its plans for the Judge Paul Pressler School of Law, though the school never opened due to funding and accreditation issues. The school's trustee board included Family Research Council leader Tony Perkins and David Barton, the Texas activist who has for years claimed that church-state separation is a “myth.” The school's dean was Mike Johnson, who was later elected speaker of the U.S. House.
In 2012, as U.S. Sen. Mitt Romney, a Mormon, led in the GOP presidential primary, Pressler gathered some of the nation's most powerful Christians at his West Texas ranch, rallying them over two days to back fellow evangelical Rick Santorum. In 2013, the Texas House honored his service to the conservative, Christian cause in a resolution that was presented on the chamber's floor. A year later, Pressler served on the advisory team for incoming Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton. And Pressler was an early and key endorser of Ted Cruz in his Senate campaign and as he ran for president in 2015.
As Pressler continued to wield political influence, he also allegedly raped, groped or solicited at least six men, including one who says he was 14 when he was first sexually abused while a member of Pressler's youth group. Those allegations were outlined in a 2017 lawsuit that also accused prominent Southern Baptist leaders and churches of concealing or enabling Pressler's behavior, which they deny.
The lawsuit was the impetus for a major 2019 investigation by the Houston Chronicle and San Antonio Express-News that found more than 400 Southern Baptist church leaders or volunteers had been charged with sex crimes since 2000. The series prompted reforms in the SBC, as well as an ongoing Department of Justice investigation into the denomination's handling of sex abuse complaints.
Pressler was a member of Houston's First or Second Baptist churches for nearly all of his adult life.
Disclosure: The University of Texas at Austin has been a financial supporter of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in the Tribune's journalism. Find a complete list of them here.
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The post Former Southern Baptist leader Paul Pressler dead at 94 appeared first on TexasTribune.org.
The Texas Tribune is a nonprofit, nonpartisan media organization that informs Texans — and engages with them — about public policy, politics, government and statewide issues.
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Texas STAAR test: Student math and science scores plummet
by By Sneha Dey, The Texas Tribune – 2024-06-14 12:47:49
SUMMARY: State testing data reveals significant declines in Texas students' math and science scores post-pandemic. Only 26% of fifth graders met science standards, a 21-point drop since 2019. Math scores also fell, with 41% of students demonstrating adequate understanding. The data underscores COVID-19's severe impact on learning, with concerns about lasting workforce implications. Texas Education Commissioner Mike Morath noted that disruptions have hindered students' math proficiency. However, bilingual students showed notable gains, surpassing pre-pandemic levels in reading and social studies. The story is developing, with upcoming appearances by political figures at The Texas Tribune Festival in Austin.
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State testing data released Friday shows students' math and science scores slipped as they continue to struggle to catch up after the pandemic.
Texas elementary students who took the State of Texas Assessments of Academic Readiness exam this spring saw striking drops in their understanding of science. Only 26% of fifth graders met science grade-level standards this year, a steep decline of 21 percentage points from 2019.
In math, Texas students lost ground after two years of modest post-pandemic gains. About 41% of students demonstrated an adequate understanding of math on their tests, with declines across grades compared to last year.
The results further illustrate the toll the COVID-19 pandemic exacted on student learning and the long road toward recovery still ahead. Education experts worry the disruption in learning could have long-lasting impacts on how students fare in the workforce.
“It's clear that math performance is not where students need it to be for success after graduation,” said Texas Education Commissioner Mike Morath. “Pandemic-induced disruptions to learning exacerbated students' difficulties in mastering fundamental math concepts.”
Elementary and middle school students from third through eighth grade are required to take the STAAR test in math and reading. In addition, fifth-graders are tested in science and eighth-graders in science and social studies.
A bright spot in the STAAR test data was the gains bilingual students have made, though their scores still lag behind the rest of the state. They've surpassed pre-pandemic levels in reading and social studies by 12 and 6 percentage points, respectively. Bilingual students have narrowed the gap between their pre- and post-pandemic performance in math and science, compared to their peers.
This is a developing story; check back for details.
Just in: Former U.S. Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wyoming; U.S. Sen. Jon Fetterman, D-Pennsylvania; and Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt will take the stage at The Texas Tribune Festival, Sept. 5–7 in downtown Austin. Buy tickets today!
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The Texas Tribune is a nonprofit, nonpartisan media organization that informs Texans — and engages with them — about public policy, politics, government and statewide issues.
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Austin gun shop owner wins fight to overturn bump stock ban
by By Dante Motley, The Texas Tribune – 2024-06-14 11:20:58
SUMMARY: An Austin gun shop owner, Michael Cargill, won a Supreme Court case overturning a federal ban on bump stocks. The court's 6-3 decision ruled that the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) wrongly classified bump stocks as machine guns under legislation banning such weapons. Bump stocks enable semi-automatic rifles to fire rapidly. Cargill's case, supported by the New Civil Liberties Alliance, argued that ATF overstepped its authority. Justice Clarence Thomas stated that bump stocks do not make a semi-automatic rifle a machine gun. Justice Sonia Sotomayor dissented, asserting bump stocks fit the machine gun definition.
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An Austin gun shop owner succeeded Friday on a years-long quest to overturn a federal ban on bump stocks, winning a 6-3 victory from the U.S. Supreme Court.
Bump stocks are devices that allow semi-automatic rifles to fire hundreds of rounds in a minute. The court ruled the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives can not include bump stocks under legislation banning machine guns. The overturned ATF rule required owners of bump stocks to either destroy them or surrender them to the ATF to avoid criminal prosecution.
The case was filed by Michael Cargill, the owner of Central Texas Gun Works and an outspoken proponent of gun rights in Texas, after he surrendered two bump stocks to the ATF. He argued that ATF incorrectly identified bump stocks as machine guns, and overstepped its power in banning them. He brought the case with the support of the advocacy group the New Civil Liberties Alliance.
The almost 100-year-old law banning machine guns defines the weapon as “any weapon which shoots, is designed to shoot, or can be readily restored to shoot, automatically more than one shot, without manual reloading, by a single function of the trigger.” The ATF began including bump stocks under the definition of “machinegun” during the Trump administration in response to the deadly mass shooting on the Las Vegas Strip in 2017.
“We hold that a semiautomatic rifle equipped with a bump stock is not a ‘machinegun' because it cannot fire more than one shot ‘by a single function of the trigger,'” wrote Clarence Thomas in the majority opinion. “And, even if it could, it would not do so ‘automatically.'”
This case does not directly address the Second Amendment but rather the limits of executive agencies' authority.
In an X.com video, Cargill expressed hope that this ruling would prevent the ATF from banning other gun accessories like braces and triggers.
Justice Sonia Sotomayor, in a dissenting opinion joined by Justices Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson, disagreed with the majority's interpretation. She wrote, “When I see a bird that walks like a duck, swims like a duck, and quacks like a duck, I call that bird a duck.”
She argued that a bump-stock-equipped semiautomatic rifle fits the definition of a machine gun because it fires “automatically more than one shot, without manual reloading, by a single function of the trigger.”
As debates over gun control and Second Amendment rights continue, this ruling underscores the ongoing tension between legislative intent and regulatory authority.
Just in: Former U.S. Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wyoming; U.S. Sen. Jon Fetterman, D-Pennsylvania; and Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt will take the stage at The Texas Tribune Festival, Sept. 5–7 in downtown Austin. Buy tickets today!
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The Texas Tribune is a nonprofit, nonpartisan media organization that informs Texans — and engages with them — about public policy, politics, government and statewide issues.
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