Cracking the Shell on Spiking Egg Prices
Which came first, bird flu or the egg shortage? Rising price tags on egg cartons have shaken consumers of all demographics. At the same time, and not at all unrelated, bird flu (H5N1) continues its rapid evolution, infecting poultry, cows on dairies, cats, and humans alike. But just how much are these two issues connected?
The way we see it, the H5N1 tinderbox is made up of a few key bits of kindling. The consolidation of our food system, subsequent corporate control, and inadequate handling of outbreaks have all contributed to the sticker-shock crisis consumers are facing all over the world.
How Did We Get Here? The Evolution of Industrial Animal Agriculture
For the first time in census history, America exceeded 10 billion land animals raised for food in 2022. In spite of this, total farmland has decreased by nearly a quarter over the last 70 years. This means that we’re growing more animals on less land—which sounds good in theory but has a number of hidden costs.
One of these costs is animal crowding. In the 1980s, a farm raising 100,000 chickens for meat per year was considered a large factory farm. Today, over 78% of chickens live in massive facilities that raise more than half a million animals annually. But some modern egg farms are even worse.
“I mean there may be three million, four million, five million head of chickens laying eggs all on one site in multiple barns.”
—Dr. Tom Tabler, PhD, Professor of Animal Science at the University of Tennessee Institute of Agriculture, to SELF.
These crowded conditions create a perfect environment for viruses to evolve. Rob Wallace, an evolutionary ecologist and author of Big Farms Make Big Flu, told science magazine Nautilus that we should “think of poultry not only as food for humans, but as ‘food for flu.’”
“If we were to get our drafting table up here, and we wanted to design how to make great virulence, this would be how.”
—Rob Wallace to Nautilus
Such intensive farming is especially problematic in the wake of H5N1. A single positive test for bird flu results in the killing, or “depopulation,” of entire flocks. According to the USDA, over 21 million laying hens have been killed since the beginning of this year. These losses come after an additional 13.2 million were killed in December 2024.
Interestingly, 71% of those 21 million hens killed this year came from conventional farms. Just 29% came from cage-free facilities, and a mere 0.1% came from organic farms.
Heightening the bird-flu alarm is the way we have responded—or failed to respond—to the virus.
Handling of H5N1
In a priority battle between safeguarding public health and not disrupting production, governments are too often slow to intervene. Sadly, profits often trump consumer safety. For example, under current laws, FDA investigators searching for the source of outbreaks can be denied entry to industrial animal farms. But outbreaks can have deadly consequences even if H5N1 is not officially detected. “A lot of the birds pretty much die within literally 48 hours,” the CEO of Wilcox Farms told KIRO Newsradio. “I mean it’s almost like 93% will die.”
So what happens when a case of bird flu on a farm is confirmed? A cautious protocol outlines a strategy for “stamping out” the disease. This means that infected animals or animals suspected of infection are killed. The USDA says “stamping-out of HPAI-infected poultry will always be part of any HPAI response policy, even if a protective vaccination strategy is implemented.”
“At that point, they don’t make you kill every bird in the house that got it, the whole farm has to go down. The government will reimburse you, basically, for the cost of the bird and the cost of having to take out the birds. The problem is, what the government doesn’t reimburse you for is for the loss of business, right? So it takes almost a year for you to get back and up running again, and that’s just on the farmer.”
—Brent Wilcox to KIRO Newsradio
In spite of the 2024 killings, bird flu continued to spread from flock to flock. In March 2024, however, bird flu was detected for the first time in cows on dairies. Though mortality rates among cows are low, large viral loads are excreted into milk from infected animals. Since the first dairy-farm outbreak, over 970 cases in cattle have been confirmed across 17 states. Yet a mandatory milk testing strategy was not implemented until December 2024.
“The real problem, which has received little attention, is the tepid and opaque response from the federal agency tasked with stopping the on-farm spread of the disease: the US Department of Agriculture (USDA).”
—Kenny Torrella, VOX
One possible source of cross-species infection is “litter feeding,” a common industry practice. Litter feeding is adding dead birds, feathers, and chicken waste to animal feed on feedlots and dairies. Some experts speculate that this practice, which is banned in the United Kingdom and Canada, is a potential pathway for contracting the virus.
At a time when we should be increasing efforts to contain bird flu, mass federal layoffs are affecting key offices and laboratories responsible for testing. Additionally, the head of the FDA food division recently resigned in the wake of the “indiscriminate firing” of roughly 89 staff members. Amid all these layoffs were seemingly accidental terminations of USDA staff specifically tasked with working on the government’s response to bird flu.
With far fewer safeguards in place, consumer confidence may begin to waver. But major corporations, which control most of our food system, are unlikely to feel much pressure.
Symptoms of Corporate Greed
Since 2022, over 115 million birds in our food system have died because of bird flu. So how is it, then, that Cal-Maine, the country’s largest egg distributor, increased their gross profits by 646% between 2021 and 2023? This is the question Farm Action asks in their latest call for an investigation.
Cal-Maine controls about 20% of the U.S. egg market. In spite of surging H5N1 infections, the company managed to maintain their production, moving about 1.1 billion dozen eggs from 2021 through 2024. Farm Action alleges that they managed this by acquiring competitors, purchasing six additional companies in 2023 alone.
But the farmer-led advocacy group is not the only one to accuse corporations of price-fixing. Cal-Maine and other egg producers paid $17.7 million in damages for conspiracy to limit egg supply. They were also accused of price-fixing by Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) in relation to bird flu in 2022.
“While avian flu has been cited as the primary driver of skyrocketing egg prices, its actual impact on production has been minimal. Instead, dominant egg producers—particularly Cal-Maine Foods—have leveraged the crisis to raise prices, amass record profits, and consolidate market power.”
—Farm Action’s letter to the FTC
Additionally, major poultry and egg corporations have received taxpayer bailouts to the tune of $1.138 billion. The most significant share of that money went to the top four producers: Cal-Maine Foods, Jennie-O Turkey, Herbruck Poultry Ranch, and Center Fresh Egg Farm.
The Cure: Where Do We Go from Here?
A recent European report warns that high-density farming, among other factors, could increase risk of bird flu transmission to humans. But our food system wasn’t always this way.
In 1950, 95% of chicken farms were independent. Only five years later, that number dropped to a mere 10%. Today, over 99% of chicken farms are factory farms. And to add insult to injury, we’re importing more and more of our produce from other countries. These are just a couple of reasons that farm transitions are a cornerstone of our work.
The Transfarmation Project® works directly with farmers to build a better, more resilient food system. We know that our industrial food system isn’t working, and pandemic risk is just one small piece of the food-systems puzzle.
A growing majority of people from all walks of life recognize that factory farms are a problem. The time has come for widespread farm transitions, and we’re proud to be a prominent part of the movement.