Bird Flu Déjà Vu from the COVID Playbook

Public health officials are responding to bird flu (H5N1) using strategies similar to COVID-19, including extensive PCR testing and fearmongering

by Dr. Joseph Mercola

Story at-a-glance

• Public health officials are responding to bird flu (H5N1) using strategies similar to COVID-19, including extensive PCR testing and fearmongering, leading to significant food supply disruptions and price increases

• Since 2022, over 150 million birds have been killed due to H5N1, with 41.4 million culled between December 2024 and January 2025 alone, resulting in soaring egg prices

• The USDA has spent $1.25 billion on compensation to affected farmers, while granting Zoetis a conditional license for a bird flu vaccine for chickens despite CDC stating H5N1 is low risk to humans

• Studies show chickens can develop natural immunity to H5N1, suggesting mass culling is unnecessary, while evidence indicates that depopulation efforts actually increase the risk of chicken-to-human transmission

• Health authorities are pursuing mRNA vaccine development, with HHS giving Moderna $590 million for human H5N1 shots, despite concerns about vaccine effectiveness and safety, and the risk of creating vaccine-resistant strains

You've noticed the news about a bird flu health crisis — sick birds, egg shortages, price hikes. The empty shelves, constant updates and confusing directives likely stir up memories of COVID. But there's a reason why bird flu, or H5N1, feels like a repeat performance. For starters, officials have been warning about a coming bird flu pandemic for years, but every instance of fearmongering about a lethal bird flu has turned out to be false.

That's why I wrote "The Great Bird Flu Hoax" in 2009. Now, bird flu is making headlines again as outbreaks occur in birds, other animals and even humans across the U.S. If it seems like déjà vu, you're not imagining it; it's deliberate. Dr. Clayton Baker, an internal medicine physician and author with the Brownstone Institute, cuts through the noise: "Bird flu is a complete rerun of the COVID script," only now it's your food supply, not your freedom, under siege.¹

Consider bird flu a set of calculated steps — pages from a playbook you've seen before. Those tasked with solving these crises — public health officials — often fuel them, a tactic rooted in years of "pandemic preparedness" groundwork. But this time, your groceries are the new battlefield. Clayton explains:²

"Last time, with COVID, the pandemic-planning bioterrorists directly blackmailed us by taking away our civil rights, in order to coerce us to accept their unsafe and ineffective vaccines. This time, with bird flu, the pandemic planning bioterrorists are indirectly blackmailing us by targeting our food, in order to coerce us to accept more of their unsafe and ineffective vaccines into our food supply and those who supply it."

Understanding Bird Flu Basics

What exactly is bird flu? H5N1 is a virus that typically affects birds such as chickens and ducks. The World Health Organization explains it's been present in wild bird populations for decades, sometimes crossing over to farm animals or, in rare cases, humans.³ The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) reports that since 2022, more than 150 million birds have been killed due to H5N1, with 41.4 million culled between December 2024 and January 2025 alone.^4,5

Authorities are testing flocks extensively, eliminating entire groups if even one bird tests positive. The ramifications extend far beyond the barnyard to your everyday routine. With tens of millions of chickens lost, eggs and poultry have become scarcer and costlier. Egg prices are expected to increase 20.3% in 2025⁶ and reached a 45-year peak in January.⁷

Further, vaccines are likely to be introduced into your food supply, altering what you consume without your consent. For instance, the USDA granted a conditional license to pharmaceutical company Zoetis for its bird flu vaccine, labelled for use in chickens.⁸ According to Baker, the CEO of Zoetis, formerly a subsidiary of Pfizer, has "close ties to Pfizer, BlackRock, and the Gates Foundation, all well-established bad actors during the COVID era."

Further, many aren't aware that in 2012, scientists genetically modified the wild H5N1 virus in a lab to create a pandemic strain that could spread through the air, raising concerns about unintended releases and lab leaks, a risk that feels all too familiar in the post-COVID era.⁹

The COVID Playbook — Same Game, Different Field

Recall the COVID pandemic for a moment. You likely remember scientists altering a virus in a lab, its subsequent escape and the sudden restrictions that kept you on lockdown awaiting a shot. As Baker notes, COVID's SARS-CoV-2 emerged from lab manipulation under the guise of pandemic preparedness, leaking in 2019, and bird flu is tracing a parallel path.

A 2012 report in The Guardian details similar experiments with H5N1, including how scientists manipulated the virus to become airborne and able to spread via droplets from coughs or sneezes.¹⁰ Bird flu shifts the focus from lockdowns to your food supply. Baker explains that instead of confining you, authorities are culling flocks to create food shortages that pressure you into accepting vaccines.

The approach remains consistent — craft a virus, develop an injection, then instill fear to ensure compliance. During COVID, PCR testing was rampant, even though PCR tests detect minute, non-threatening traces of the virus, leading to false positives and raising alarm unnecessarily.

Today, they're applying the same tactic to poultry, relying on misleading PCR tests as they ramp up testing for bird flu. They're testing not only birds but also milk and farmers relentlessly, stacking up misleading positive results to sustain the tension. Baker explains that this isn't conspiracy theory — it's pattern recognition:¹¹

"To perpetuate the mass slaughter and worsen food shortages, 'public health' authorities are performing indiscriminate PCR testing for the virus among the animal population and farmers, knowing full well this will generate countless false positives ...

Authorities are using this excessive testing along with media-generated fear-mongering and governmental abuse of power, to prolong the mass slaughter of farm animals and the food shortages. The mass slaughter of farm animals and resulting food shortages are being used to blackmail the population into mass acceptance of the vaccines in their food supply, in exchange for a return to normal life."

Why This Hurts You and Your Food

Eliminating over 150 million birds doesn't halt the H5N1 virus — it reduces your food availability. Yet, the USDA has invested $1.25 billion in indemnity and compensation payments to farmers affected by bird flu since 2022.¹² This means your tax dollars are directly funding a strategy that isn't working.

In fact, it's making things worse. As Nicolas Hulscher, an epidemiologist with the University of Michigan School of Public Health, points out, this massive expenditure not only incentivizes farmers to comply with the mass killing of their animals but also represents a serious misuse of taxpayer money, triggering a cascade of severe downstream consequences.¹³

One of the most immediate consequences you're experiencing is the skyrocketing price of eggs. This makes a basic food staple less affordable for everyone. Further, Hulscher highlights a disturbing connection between mass culling and chicken-to-human transmission of H5N1. A study published in The New England Journal of Medicine found that 100% of poultry-linked human H5N1 cases were traced back to these depopulation efforts.¹⁴

So, the very actions intended to "protect" public health are increasing the risk of human infection. Perhaps most concerning is the fact that mass culling isn't even necessary. Hulscher cites three separate studies demonstrating that chickens can survive H5N1 infection and develop natural immunity. This natural immunity then helps to limit future spread of the virus. This evidence suggests a far more effective and less costly approach than the current mass slaughter.

Hulscher argues that the USDA's current biosecurity strategies are clearly failing, especially given the continuous reinfection of farms by wild mallard ducks. He calls for the USDA to be transparent about their testing methods to end the unnecessary culling of healthy birds, and to allow natural immunity to develop as a more sustainable solution.

Bird Flu Shots on the Horizon

Bird flu shots are now front and center. In addition to the USDA's conditional license for Zoetis' bird flu vaccine for chickens, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services agreed to give Moderna $590 million to develop an mRNA vaccine for H5N1 in humans — even though the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said bird flu is a low risk to people.¹⁵

Dr. Robert Malone draws parallels to the COVID-19 pandemic response, particularly regarding the use of mRNA technology:¹⁶

"No evidence exists that any influenza vaccine will provide anything even close to sterilizing immunity (complete protection from infection, replication, and spread). In other words, what we can reliably predict is that the Moderna product that you are paying for will provide yet another leaky influenza vaccine with the added risks associated with current mRNA vaccine technology."

Why, Malone asks, aren't they exploring other options, like breeding poultry that are naturally resistant to H5N1? It's a valid point, especially considering H5N1's prevalence in wild birds — it's not going away. He echoes Hulscher's criticisms of mass culling, pointing out its failures: the virus continues to spread, egg prices are through the roof and there's even an increased risk of the virus jumping from chickens to the people handling them.

And remember, all this is costing you — $1.25 billion of your tax money has been spent on this ineffective strategy. Malone warns that the USDA's current policies, including mass culling and the upcoming use of these leaky mRNA vaccines, could make things worse.

They could lead to the evolution of vaccine-resistant strains of H5N1, which could then spread back into wild birds and even infect humans. There's also the fact that influenza viruses, like H5N1, mutate rapidly. So, even if an mRNA shot is developed for one strain, it won't work against the next. This would lead to the promotion of ongoing booster shots, another page from the COVID playbook.

What You Can Do to Stop the Playbook

The first step to break free from this destructive cycle is understanding that it exists. From there, urge officials to stop mass flock culls. "It traumatizes farmers, wastes resources, creates food shortages, is inhumane in the extreme to animals, and does nothing to stop the virus. Let the flocks develop natural immunity," Baker says.¹⁷

He also advises ending the use of PCR testing for bird flu in animals and humans, noting, "Willy-nilly PCR testing creates innumerable false positives, which fuels the ... hysteria, paralyzes decision-makers, and promotes population-wide blackmail." Baker recommends an overhaul on leadership as well, including removing USDA and CDC heads stuck on this flawed approach and disbanding the Office of Pandemic Preparedness and Response Policy.

While cleaning house, Baker calls for investigations into the USDA Southeast Poultry Research Lab in Athens, Georgia, and the Kawaoka Bird Flu Lab at the University of Wisconsin, which are involved in gain-of-function research on H5N1. Multiple accidents involving H5N1 have been reported at the University of Wisconsin lab over the years.¹⁸ Meanwhile, oppose hasty shot rollouts while supporting natural immunity and breeding H5N1-resistant flocks instead.

The unfolding bird flu narrative serves as a chilling echo of the COVID-19 pandemic, starkly illustrating a playbook dusted off and redeployed. From the familiar refrains of fearmongering and questionable testing to the push for pharmaceutical interventions and the disregard for natural solutions, the patterns are undeniable.

This time, the battlefield has shifted from our civil liberties to our dinner tables, with food security now under siege through policies that are less about genuine public health and more about control and corporate gain.

To break free from this déjà vu, you must recognize this pattern for what it is: a calculated strategy playing out once more. The lesson from COVID is clear: unquestioning compliance with top-down directives leads to predictable and detrimental outcomes. It's time to demand transparency, challenge the prevailing narrative, advocate for evidence-based solutions like natural immunity and, ultimately, refuse to let history, or rather, the playbook, repeat itself.

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