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Wisconsin’s milk testing to use existing collection system

State officials say Wisconsin’s participation in the national milk testing strategy for the H5N1 virus will have little impact on producers.

Adam Brock, the ag department’s Division Administrator for Food and Recreational Safety says Wisconsin chose to use a milk collection and testing system that was already in place for testing milk quality. “Those samples show up at the quality testing labs. A portion of that is aliquoted off or a small portion is taken and put in the vials and then sent to WVDL” which is the Wisconsin Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratory at the University of Wisconsin.

Brock says using the existing milk quality samples means no additional sample taking and no additional people visiting the farms. “So we’re not only optimizing the solution, what we’re trying to do is not waste the milk so it can still undergo its quality testing. We take a small portion off for this specific H5N1 test.”

Wisconsin has the most dairy farms in the nation with more than five-thousand farms, and all of them must be tested monthly.  Brock says there will be over 1,250 samples tested every week once testing has ramped up. “We have trialed. I know WVDL has done some trial of non-H5N1 just to see if the process works and we’re confident that will work.”

If H5N1 is detected on a Wisconsin dairy farm, the Wisconsin Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratory will notify the Division of Animal Health, which will work with farms regarding quarantine requirements and animal movement.  Since pasteurization makes the milk safe for consumption, farms may continue shipping milk from infected herds if it meets “normal” milk standards defined by the Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection.