Bird disease traced to Milton
MILTON — A disease traced to local vendor Preferred Birds Inc. may have spread to humans in Minnesota, according to the Santa Rosa County Health Department.
Test results for psittacosis are not back on employees of the unnamed company there, said Santa Rosa Environmental Health Manager Bill Sirmans. If results are positive, the workers will be treated with antibiotics, he said.
Psittacosis, also known as parrot fever, originates from wild birds and poultry. Humans contract it by inhaling dried secretions from an infected bird. Symptoms are flu-like and treatable, although they may develop into more serious conditions like pneumonia if left unchecked.
Psittacosis is not the bird flu.
PetSmart pet store chain has suspended selling birds after 21 infected ones were found in stores in numerous states, said company spokeswoman Jennifer Simmons. The chain routinely tests pets at its stores and discovered psittacosis in birds for sale.
Some 775 stores in 46 states were affected, she said.
“We suspended sales as a precautionary measure,” Simmons said. “It doesn’t mean an infected bird was found in every store.”
She said customers who bought birds from PetSmart were sent a form letter advising of the disease, the findings and offering a contact number to them.
Preferred Birds in Milton is considered a “large vendor” said Simmons. The sick birds were traced to the dealer and beyond that to at least one breeder in another part of Florida, according to Sirmans.
The company is under quarantine and is not selling birds until released by the Florida Department of Health. Sirmans said all the birds at the facility are being treated, with 40 tests being sent out.
“We don’t know exactly how long it will be before they will be back in business,” Sirmans said.
He said one newly arrived bird at Preferred Birds was infected.
“They changed a procedure to give antibiotics to birds,” Sirmans said. “They were hand-feeding the antibiotic (routinely) and then began feeding the birds treated feed. I don’t know exactly what it entails, but it was a procedural practice that didn’t work out. They switched back to hand-feeding after only a month.”
An employee at Preferred Bird, who asked not be identified, said the birds sent to Petsmart did not have a middleman and were not infected after they left the dealer. Sirmans confirmed the birds were infected when they left Santa Rosa County.
Jim Steel, manager at PetSmart in Destin, said it was possible that one or two birds at his store were infected, so the company stopped selling birds as a precaution.
Psittacosis was blamed for about 11 deaths in Pittsburgh, Pa., in 1934. Parrots sold at a local department store were blamed and 180 birds were destroyed.
Sirmans said that was before the use of antibiotics.