TUESDAY, Feb. 18, 2025 (HealthDay News) -- The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) has granted conditional approval for a new bird flu vaccine for poultry. This new avian flu vaccine, developed by New Jersey-based Zoetis, was approved last week after meeting safety and efficacy standards.

The US Department of Agriculture last week issued a conditional license for an avian flu vaccine for use in chickens, as an outbreak of a newer variant ravages poultry flocks, contributing to the sky high price of eggs.

The illness, which infects chickens and many other birds, has pushed egg prices through the roof in the past few months. Vaccinating flocks, however, could hurt the poultry industry on the global market.

A veterinary pharmaceutical company said they have received a conditional license for a bird flu vaccine to be used on chickens, potentially marking the first step toward mitigating a disease that has affected more than 150 million birds in the United States since 2022.

Over the last 30 days, 151 flocks have been confirmed to have avian flu, affecting more than 23 million birds, according to the Animal Planet Health Inspection Service part of the USDA. Dr. Paul Offit, of the FDA Vaccine Advisory Committee, says people could also become sick.

In the past three years, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) says about 150 million birds died across the country due to the virus. This month, the USDA granted a conditional license to Zoetis for its Avian Influenza Vaccine.

More recently, a fox in North Dakota, a bobcat in the state of Washington, a cat in Oregon and a harbor seal in Massachusetts have been infected.