As the United States continues to grapple with bird flu, health officials of the country are reevaluating a $590 million contract for bird flu shots that was awarded to Moderna, Bloomberg News reported on Wednesday.
The US government had awarded Moderna $590 million in January to advance the development of its bird flu vaccine.
Reportedly, this was in addition to the $176 million awarded by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) last year to complete the late-stage development and testing of a pre-pandemic mRNA-based vaccine against the H5N1 avian influenza.
The review is part of a government push to examine spending on messenger RNA-based vaccines, the technology that powered Moderna’s Covid vaccine, according to the report.
A NBC report reveals that a three-year bird flu outbreak in U.S. poultry has killed 166 million chickens since 2022, according to USDA data. The virus has also infected nearly 1,000 dairy herds and almost 70 people, including one death, since early 2024.
On Wednesday, Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins said that the United States will invest up to $1 billion to combat the spread of bird flu, including increasing imports of eggs.
Last year, the administration of former President Joe Biden allocated more than $800 million to combat bird flu in livestock.