Egg prices have seen a steady increase over the past few years but price spikes have never been this extraordinary until recently. One Twitter user posted that cartons of 18 eggs (not organic or pasture-raised) cost $10 and have anti-theft alarms attached to them. While inflation and supply chain issues play a role in this, the main culprit behind the price spike is a raging avian flu pandemic impacting 58.59 million birds and counting.
The Hidden Pandemic That Started in 2020
Viruses mutate constantly and the flu breaks out every year for all sorts of animals. There are four major types of influenza viruses, types A, B, C, and D, with various strains and variants as well as varying host ranges. These flu strains constantly mutate, which might result in cross-infection with other species or zoonotic transmission to humans, which was the case back in 2009 during the H1N1 swine flu pandemic….