​'Civilized People Do Not Starve Children to Death': Sanders Rips US-Backed Israel's 68-Day Gaza Aid Blockade

"What we are seeing now is a slow, brutal process of mass starvation and death by the denial of basic necessities," the senator said, calling for an end to U.S. complicity in the humanitarian disaster.



Displaced Palestinians, including children, wait with empty pots to receive food distributed by humanitarian organizations at the Jabalia Refugee Camp in the northern Gaza Strip on May 7, 2025.
(Photo: Mahmoud Issa/Anadolu via Getty Images)

Jessica Corbett
May 08, 2025
COMMON DREAMS

"Today marks 68 days and counting since ANY humanitarian aid was allowed into Gaza. For more than nine weeks, Israel has blocked all supplies: no food, no water, no medicine, and no fuel."

U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) not only highlighted those conditions in a speech on the Senate floor Thursday but also called out the fact that the worsening humanitarian crisis "gets very little discussion here in the nation's capital or in the halls of Congress," even though Israel has spent the past 19 months destroying Gaza with armed and diplomatic support from the United States.

"Hundreds of truckloads of lifesaving supplies are waiting to enter Gaza, sitting just across the border, but are denied entry by Israeli authorities," Sanders pointed out, echoing the U.S. nonprofit World Central Kitchen, which said Wednesday that it "no longer has the supplies to cook meals or bake bread," but "our trucks—loaded with food and supplies—are waiting in Egypt, Jordan, and Israel, ready to enter Gaza."

The senator took aim at Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who is wanted by the International Criminal Court for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity in the Palestinian territory, and key members of his administration.

"There is no ambiguity here: Netanyahu's extremist government talks openly about using humanitarian aid as a weapon," Sanders declared. "Defense Minister Israel Katz said, 'Israel's policy is clear: No humanitarian aid will enter Gaza, and blocking this aid is one of the main pressure levers.'"

"The time is long overdue for us to end our support for Netanyahu's destruction of the Palestinian people."

Noting that Israel's actions run afoul of U.S. and international law, Sanders said: "Starving children to death as a weapon of war is a clear violation of the Geneva Convention, the Foreign Assistance Act, and basic human decency. Civilized people do not starve children to death. What is going on in Gaza is a war crime, committed openly and in broad daylight, and continuing every single day."

Since the Hamas-led October 7, 2023 attack on Israel, the Israeli assault on Gaza has killed more than 52,000 Palestinians. According to local officials, at least 57 Palestinians have died from malnutrition and a lack of adequate medical care. Many more are struggling to find food and water, particularly since Israel ramped up its blockade on March 2.

"With Israel having cut off all aid, what we are seeing now is a slow, brutal process of mass starvation and death by the denial of basic necessities. This is methodical, it is intentional, it is the stated policy of the Netanyahu government," said Sanders. "Without fuel, there is no ability to pump fresh water, leaving people increasingly desperate, unable to find clean water to drink, or wash with, or cook properly. Disease is once again spreading in Gaza."

Families in Gaza "are now surviving on scarce canned goods," and "the starvation hits children hardest," the senator continued. "With no infant formula, and with malnourished mothers unable to breastfeed, many infants are also at severe risk of death."

"What is going on in Gaza today is a manmade nightmare," one that "will be a permanent stain on the world's collective conscience," he said. "History will never forget that we allowed this to happen and, for us here in the United States, that we, in fact, enabled this ongoing atrocity."



Sanders has moved to block some U.S. weapons sales under both the Biden and second Trump administrations, but his efforts have not garnered enough support in Congress to succeed. Still, people across the United States and around the world have condemned the Israeli assault on Gaza as genocide—and Israel faces a case on the subject at the International Court of Justice.

The senator spotlighted Israel's latest plan for Gaza, Operation Gideon's Chariots, which involves "conquering" and indefinitely occupying the territory, and ethnically cleansing the region of its Palestinian inhabitants, who would be force into the south.

"This would be a terrible tragedy, no matter where in the world it was happening or why it was happening—whatever the causes of it might be. But what makes this tragedy so much worse for us in America is that it is our government, the United States government, that is absolutely complicit in creating and sustaining this humanitarian disaster," he said.

"It didn't just happen," Sanders emphasized. "Last year alone, the United States provided $18 billion in military aid to Israel. This year, the Trump administration has approved $12 billion more in bombs and weapons."

For months, U.S. President Donald Trump "has offered blanket support for Netanyahu," the senator said. "More than that, he has repeatedly said that the United States will actually take over Gaza after the war, that the Palestinian people will be driven—forcibly expelled—from their homeland, and the United States will redevelop it into what Trump calls 'the Riviera of the Middle East,' a playground for billionaires."

Citing unnamed sources, Reutersreported Wednesday that "the United States and Israel have discussed the possibility of Washington leading a temporary post-war administration of Gaza," sparking global criticism and comparisons to the U.S. misadventures in Iraq in the early 2000s.



"This war has killed or injured more than 170,000 people in Gaza. It has cost American taxpayers well over $20 billion in the last year. And right now, as we speak, thousands of children are starving to death," Sanders detailed. "And the U.S. president is actively encouraging the ethnic cleansing of over 2 million people."

"Given that reality, one might think that there would be a vigorous discussion right here in the Senate: Do we really want to spend billions of taxpayer dollars starving children in Gaza?" the senator bellowed. "You tell me why spending billions of dollars to support Netanyahu's war and starving children in Gaza is a good idea. I'd love to hear it."

Sanders then made the case that the U.S. Senate isn't having that debate "because we have a corrupt campaign finance system" that allows organizations like the American Israel Public Affairs Committee to set the agenda in Washington, D.C. He pointed to AIPAC and its super political action committee spending over $100 million in the latest election cycle.

"And the fact is that, if you are a member of Congress and you vote against Netanyahu's war in Gaza, AIPAC is there to punish you with millions of dollars in advertisements to see that you're defeated," he said. "Sadly, I must confess, that this political corruption works. Many of my colleagues will privately express their horror at Netanyahu's war crimes, but will do or say very little publicly about it."

"The time is long overdue for us to end our support for Netanyahu's destruction of the Palestinian people. We must not put another nickel into Netanyahu's war machine," he concluded. "We must demand an immediate cease-fire, a surge in humanitarian aid, the release of the hostages, and the rebuilding of Gaza—not for billionaires to enjoy their Riviera there, but rebuilding Gaza for the Palestinian people."

Let Them Die Alone, and Hungry

Osama Al-Raqab, 6, is one of tens of thousands of Gazan children slowly starving.
Screenshot from NBC

OPINION
Abby Zimet
May 06, 2025
COMMON DREAMS


"Drunk on impunity," Israel has grandiosely labeled its latest genocidal move "Operation Gideon's Chariots" wherein, moving from siege to seizure, it plans the bloody conquest, ethnic cleansing, and permanent recolonization of Gaza, using the rhetoric of holy war to justify unholy mass destruction - this, even as many of the Palestinian children who've somehow survived their savage 18 months of carnage now slowly starve to death. "We are complicit," says one angry, grieving doctor. "It is an abomination."

Having gotten away with so many atrocities while the international community looks away, Israel just unveiled the latest escalation of its illegal collective punishment of Gazans by finally declaring out loud, "We are occupying Gaza to stay." Unanimously approved by Netanyahu's far-right Security Cabinet, the new "conquering of Gaza" formalizes Israel's plan for the indefinite occupation, forced expulsion and incorporation into "sanitized" Israeli zones of an already long-besieged civilian population "for its own protection." The expansion of an onslaught that has left more than 185,000 Gazans dead, wounded, or missing and millions homeless, hungry, maimed and traumatized is being ludicrously framed as a final mission to dismantle Hamas and retrieve hostages, even though Israel repeatedly failed at each before breaking a ceasefire that would have accomplished both.

"Gideon’s Chariots will begin with great force and will not end until all its objectives are achieved," Israel thundered, again virtually ignoring the fact that permanent occupation, forced displacement and ethnic cleansing violate international law. "No more going in and out - this is a war for victory," said apartheid Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, who urged Israelis embrace, not fear the word "occupation...A people that wants to live must occupy its land." But the name Gideon's Chariots, Merkavot Gideon, invoking the righteous Biblical warrior who led a chosen few to annihilate an ancient Arab people, "layers this symbolism with menace," blending the concepts of divine vengeance with state-sanctioned ethnic violence, the "mythic instruments of war (with) the Israeli Merkava tanks that have long razed homes and lives in Gaza and the West Bank."

Sicker, darker undercurrents reportedly surfaced during a Cabinet meeting rife with genocidal banter. After a minister leered that Gazans should "die with the Philistines," Gaza's ancient inhabitants, Netanyahu refuted the idea with, "No. We don’t want to die with them. We want them to die alone." Ominously, the proposal also calls for (now-banned) international aid groups to be replaced with private U.S. military contractors, aka mercenaries, distributing aid at Israeli-designated relief "hubs," which critics call "not an aid plan but an aid denial plan" that flagrantly violates international principles that prohibit an occupier from exploiting humanitarian needs to achieve military or political objectives. Gazan officials angrily rejected the idea as "perpetuation of a malicious policy of siege and starvation...The Occupation cannot be a humanitarian mediator (when) it is the source and instrument of the tragedy."

Any illusion of Israel abruptly becoming a merciful presence in Palestinian lives was shattered Tuesday when far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich proclaimed at a West Bank conference, “Gaza will be entirely destroyed." He added Gazan civilians "will start to leave in great numbers (to) third countries," with hopes the territory would be formally annexed "during the current government’s term." He did not mention such annexation or any acquisition of land by military force is forbidden as a founding principle of international law, including the UN charter. Citing a 2024 report by Amnesty International titled You Feel You Are Subhuman, Dalal Yassine writes that Gaza most bitterly represents the end of humanitarian law: "The past 19 months of genocide have not only demonstrated the double standard imposed on Palestinians in Gaza, but also that there is no standard at all."

And as it's been all along, the U.S. remains complicit. Israel will not act until after an upcoming trip by Trump, who's voiced no objections - his gold-plated hotel beckons - and as usual gets it all wrong, blaming Hamas for treating Gazans "badly." "People are starving, and we’re going to help them get food," he yammered. "Hamas is making it impossible (by) taking everything that’s brought in." This week, our complicity came into harsher, shocking focus when nine former Biden officials admitted its months-long claims of "working tirelessly" for a ceasefire - a phrase used by Biden, Harris, even AOC, and derided by skeptics as "not a thing" - were all a lie. No demands were made - a moral and political crime re-enforced by a 2024 memo finding "insufficient evidence" linking U.S. arms to rights violations or Israel to blocked aid. One critic: "The lack of concern about Palestinian lives is palpable."

Still, the killing goes on, with about half the dead women and children. Implausibly, Israeli forces grow ever more savage: Drones often fire on civil defense teams trying to retrieve the wounded under debris, soldiers just executed 15 Palestine Red Crescent workers, their hands and feet bound, before burying them and their ambulances in the sand; hundreds of doctors, aid workers and journalists have been killed. Last month, they included Ahmad Mansour, burned alive in a media tent, and Fatima Hassouna, a "self-made fighter" colleagues called "the Eye of Gaza," for whom the camera was a weapon to "preserve a voice, tell a story." She died with six siblings, just before her wedding, a day after it was announced a film featuring her, Put Your Soul on Your Hand and Walk, will screen at the Cannes Film Festival. "If I die, I want a resounding death," she wrote last year. "Fatima planned for joy," said a friend. "Despite the war, she insisted on dreaming."

With Israeli power left untethered, Arab nations largely silent and international rules of law ignored, what's left to protect Gazan lives are mere small gestures. Hundreds of Israelis attend silent vigils to hold images of dead Palestinian children; Artists Against Apartheid and other groups protested in D.C. bearing the names of the dead and installing 17,000 pairs of children's shoes as a searing memorial; Swedish Television announced an initiative to convert the late Pope Francis’s car into a mobile clinic for Gazan children, fulfilling his final wish; World Central Kitchen barely manages to keep open its mobile bakery, the last bakery in Gaza: "We are now near (the) limits of what is possible." Still, desperate hunger mounts. Most Gazans face "acute levels of food insecurity," with more and more children dying from "starvation-related complications," a now-common term that should not exist.

Aid officials say close to 300,000 children are on the brink of starvation; about a third of those under two suffer from "acute malnutrition," with the rate swiftly climbing; more than 3,500 under five face imminent death from starvation; at least 27 have died from malnutrition, and at least several more die each day, often newborns of mothers who cannot produce milk. To date, the Israeli onslaught has directly killed over 15,000 children; for every direct death, says The Lancet medical journal, there are up to four indirect deaths from hunger, disease, the collapse of small bodies' immunity and a country's once-flourishing healthcare system. If they can, sunken-cheeked children who've lost half their body weight scavenge in mountains of trash for anything to fill their stomachs alongside their frantic parents: "I don’t want my child to die hungry." One mother: "As people, we are almost dead."

The stories and images horrify: Stick-thin, Auschwitz-like limbs protrude, ribs jut from concave chests, eyes grow wide and glazed. Once vibrant, they lie in bed, skin on bone, too weak to walk, stand, turn, lift their head, eventually breathe. An emaciated six-year-old weighing half what he should writhes on a bed, pleading, "I want to leave." A four-month-old, six-pound girl died of malnutrition, blood acidity, liver and kidney failure after her hair and nails fell out. Of newborn twin girls, one died eight days later. A father's father's infant son Abdelaziz died hours after his severely malnourished mother gave birth to him; hospital staff hooked Abdelaziz, premature and gasping, to a ventilator; it stopped a few hours later when the hospital ran out of fuel, and he died "immediately." "I am losing my son before my eyes," says one mother. "In these beds, we are waiting for them to die one by one."

Each day, says Tareq Hailat of the Palestine Children's Relief Fund, up to ten sick children in Gaza need urgent medical evacuation, but, "It's just not happening." Each one, he stresses, has a story: "They aren't just a number." Among the handful his group managed to get out was 6-year-old Fadi al-Zant from Gaza City, who had cystic fibrosis; he was also starving. When his mother couldn't find food or medication, Fadi's weight dropped from 66 to 26 pounds and he became too weak to walk, he was miraculously evacuated to first Egypt, then New York. Once the media began following his story, Fadi became "the face of starvation in Gaza." But he was a rare, blessed exception. "We are breaking the bodies and minds of the children of Gaza," says Michael Ryan, executive director of WHO. "We are starving the children of Gaza. We are complicit. As a physician, I am angry. It is an abomination."

There are so many. Drop Site Newsposted video of the distraught mother of four-month-old Yousef al-Najjar as he lay curled on a hospital bed, small fists flailing, suffering from malnutrition and dehydration. He weighed just 3.3 pounds, one fourth of what he should have weighed. His young mother lamented: He has had spasms trying to breathe, his entire ribcage sticks out, she has never experienced this before, she doesn't know each morning if he's survived: "The woman you see before you is begging for money to feed her children." She held him in her arms, then repeatedly lofted him into the unlistening air, arms straight before her, up and down, up and down, almost weightless. "Why is this happening to us?" she cried. "I swear to God, it's wrong what is happening to us." On Monday, Yousef died from malnutrition, and Israel. May his memory be for a blessing.

Update: More horrors: "Absolute savagery."

Bonkers': US, Israel Reportedly Discuss US-Led Administration in Gaza 

"Right, because the U.S. occupation of Iraq is certainly the best-case scenario for Gaza today," one critic quipped.

U.S. President Donald Trump welcomes Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to the White House on April 7, 2025.
(Photo: Demetrius Freeman/The Washington Post via Getty Images)

Jessica Corbett
May 07, 2025
COMMON DREAMS


Reutersreported Wednesday that "the United States and Israel have discussed the possibility of Washington leading a temporary post-war administration of Gaza, according to five people familiar with the matter," sparking widespread criticism across the globe.

Responses to the reporting on social media included: "Bonkers." "Madness." "Crazy and dangerous idea, besides being illegal."


Under both the Biden and Trump administrations, the U.S. government has provided armed and diplomatic support to Israel in the wake of the Hamas-led October 7, 2023 attack. The Israeli assault over the past 19 months has killed at least 52,653 Palestinians, with thousands more missing. Survivors have been repeatedly displaced and are struggling to find food thanks to an aid blockade.

According to Reuters, other unnamed nations "would be invited to take part" in the provisional U.S.-led administration, which "would draw on Palestinian technocrats but would exclude Islamist group Hamas and the Palestinian Authority."

As the news agency detailed:
The sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity as they were not authorized to discuss the talks publicly, compared the proposal to the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq that Washington established in 2003, shortly after the U.S.-led invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein.

The authority was perceived by many Iraqis as an occupying force and it transferred power to an interim Iraqi government in 2004 after failing to contain a growing insurgency.

Several critics of the reported "high-level" talks also cited the United States' misadventures in Iraq in the early 2000s.



"This would be a rerun of the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq, but in a war-ravaged territory that isn't even a sovereign state and in which no American official has been allowed to set foot for two decades," said Gregg Carlstrom, Middle East correspondent for The Economist. "So bonkers, in fact, that whoever is floating this idea for Gaza is literally comparing it to the CPA in Iraq, an entity which two decades later remains a byword for waste, corruption, and incompetence."


Alexander Langlois, a contributing fellow at the foreign policy think tank Defense Priorities, quipped: "Right, because the U.S. occupation of Iraq is certainly the best-case scenario for Gaza today. Because that went so well the first time. It's clear Washington has learned nothing, in no small part because it refuses to actually reflect on such failures."

Journalist Bobby Ghosh said, "I'm guessing Paul Bremer has pulled on his boots and is waiting by the phone," a reference to the American diplomat who led the CPA in Iraq.



While the office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu—a fugitive of the International Criminal Court whose government also faces a genocide case at the International Court of Justice over conduct in Gaza—declined to comment, a spokesperson for U.S. State Department sent Reuters a statement that did not address the news agency's questions.

"We want peace, and the immediate release of the hostages," the U.S. spokesperson said, referring to captives taken by Palestinian militants in October 2023. "The pillars of our approach remain resolute: stand with Israel, stand for peace."

Earlier this week, Netanyahu's Security Cabinet unanimously approved Operation Gideon's Chariots, a plan that involves "conquering" Gaza, occupying the Palestinian territory, and forcibly expelling its residents to the southern part of the strip.

Israeli Cabinet Minister Ze'ev Elkin suggested Monday that U.S. President Donald Trump would not object to the plan, claiming, "I don't feel that there is pressure on us from Trump and his administration—they understand exactly what is happening here."

Trump in February proposed a U.S. takeover of Gaza. He said that "we'll own it and be responsible for dismantling all of the dangerous unexploded bombs and other weapons on the site, level the site, and get rid of the destroyed buildings—level it out and create an economic development that will supply unlimited numbers of jobs and housing for the people of the area."

In response to Reuters' Wednesday reporting, University of Florida political science professor Michael McDonald nodded to those remarks, saying, "‪One step closer to Trump's dream of bulldozing Gaza to build Trump resorts." ‪

Some critics connected the potential plan for Gaza to the Trump administration's other international endeavors. U.K.-based Jewish Voice for Labour‪ said: "First Canada, then Greenland, now Palestine. This is what 21st-century imperialism looks like."

Johns Hopkins University historian Eugene Finkel—who was born in Ukraine and grew up in Israel—sarcastically said, "Because the U.S. does state-building, governance of places destroyed by U.S. weapons, and reconstruction even more effectively than Israel does conflict resolution."

"I was skeptical it was possible to produce something more unhinged than Trump's peace plans for Ukraine," Finkel added, "but hey, I've underestimated them."

MAKE AMERIKA WHITE AGAIN

While Locking Out Most Refugees, Trump Admin Poised to Resettle Group of White Afrikaners in US

"Thousands of refugees from across the globe remain stranded in limbo despite being fully vetted and approved for travel," said one refugee advocate.


White South Africans supporting U.S. President Donald Trump and South African and U.S. tech billionaire Elon Musk gather in front of the U.S. Embassy in Pretoria, South Africa on February 15, 2025 for a demonstration.
(Photo: Marco Longari/AFP via Getty Images)

Eloise Goldsmith
May 09, 2025
COMMON DREAMS


While the Trump administration has largely halted refugee resettlement in the United States, in the coming days the U.S. government is gearing up to welcome a group of Afrikaners whom officials have determined are refugees.

A group of 54 Afrikaners, white South Africans largely descended from Dutch settlers, have been granted refugee status and are slated to arrive in the U.S. on Monday, according toNPR, which cited three unnamed sources. There will reportedly be a press conference featuring high level officials from the U.S. Department of State and Department of Homeland Security to welcome them at the airport, which one unnamed source told the outlet would be unusual.

In February, U.S. President Donald Trump signed an executive order announcing that the U.S. would "promote the resettlement of Afrikaner refugees escaping government-sponsored race-based discrimination, including racially discriminatory property confiscation."

Trump was referring to a law passed into South Africa earlier this year, allowing the government to take land under set circumstances, when it is not being used or when it would be in the public interest to redistribute the land. The law is meant to help rectify the economic exclusion that Black South Africans faced during apartheid. In February, South African President Cyril Ramaphosa said that the government "has not confiscated any land."

Billionaire Elon Musk, who has played a core role in the Trump administration's efforts to slash government spending and personnel and is South African-born, has accused the government of South Africa of having "openly racist ownership laws."

According to a memo first obtained by the outlet The Lever, officials in the Department of Health and Human Services' Office of Refugee Resettlement sought approval from Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for the "mobilization of immediate support for vulnerable incoming Afrikaner refugees," including "housing, health services, and resettlement support upon their arrival." Kennedy greenlit the request.

The Lever reporter who broke the story told NPR that officials made the request because the Trump administration has restricted the usual procedures and channels for assisting refugees.

The Lever also reported that the Office of Refugee Resettlement is planning tap funds from the Preferred Communities program in order to resettle the Afrikaners, a program that's reserved to support particularly vulnerable populations.

Sources who serve refugees in the United States indicated they are ready to help the incoming Afrikaners, but drew a contrast between the administration's readiness to accept this group while other refugee populations have been left stranded due to White House actions.

HIAS, one agency that contracts with the U.S. government to resettle refugees, is committed to welcoming Afrikaners, the organization's president, Mark Hetfield, told the Times. However, "we are profoundly disturbed that the administration has slammed the door in the face of thousands of other refugees approved by [the Department of Homeland Security] months ago, notwithstanding courts ordering the White House to let many of them in."

"Thousands of refugees from across the globe remain stranded in limbo despite being fully vetted and approved for travel, including Afghan allies, religious minorities, and other populations facing extreme violence and persecution," Timothy Young, a spokesperson for Global Refuge, which also supports refugees entering the U.S., told the Times. "We hope this development reflects a broader readiness to uphold the promise of protection for all refugees who meet longstanding legal standards, regardless of their country of origin."

Prior to Trump's first term in office, refugee resettlement generally took 18 to 24 months, according to the American Immigration Council. The Afrikaners set to arrive only had to wait three months, the Times reported. U.S. officials looked at over 8,000 requests from Afrikaners expressing interest in being resettled in the United States, also per the Times.

Trump Is Robbing Public Health to Pay for His Deportation Conveyer Belt



For $40 billion-worth of health cuts to come as our government wants to spend $45 billion to become Amazon-efficient at shipping human beings to foreign prisons is establishing this nation as a beacon of cruelty.

Demonstrators attend a protest against U.S. President Donald Trump and Elon Musk's DOGE cuts to medical research and higher education during a "Fund Don't Freeze" rally outside the Health and Human Services headquarters in Washington, D.C. on February 19, 2025.
(Photo: Saul Loeb/AFP via Getty Images)

Derrick Z. Jackson
May 10, 2025

Union of Concerned Scientists/Blog

The Trump administration wants to spend $45 billion to build an inhumane deportation industry while planning to cut at least $40 billion in life-saving programs from the Department of Health and Human Services. The juxtaposition is a near-perfect gauge of how heartless our government has become in the richest nation on Earth.

For deportation, the administration virtually froths for an Amazon-like fulfillment center to robotically sort out handcuffed humans and shuffle them down the aisles onto trucks and planes.

Todd Lyons, the acting director of the Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE), recently told private security companies seeking contracts that ICE needs to be “like Amazon, trying to get your product delivered in 24 hours… trying to figure out how to do that with human beings and trying to get them pretty much all over the globe is really something for us.”

So far, all that the government is proving is how cruel it is in running roughshod over due process to separate children from parents and deport U.S. citizen children, including one with late-stage cancer.

That is really something, on many levels. One is the sheer immorality of reducing humans to shrink-wrapped products to shove onto conveyor belts and stack on forklifts. Another is that so far, ICE is as indiscriminate and incompetent as Amazon is efficient. President Donald Trumppromised “the largest deportation program of criminals in the history of America.” Border czar Tom Homan said the United States government was “targeting the worst of the worst” for deportation.

Instead, there have been notorious incidents of students being rounded up for exercising their right to free speech and deportations of untold numbers of people without U.S. criminal records. One recent notorious case is that of 238 mostly Venezuelan migrants deported to prisons in El Salvador; Bloomberg Newsfound that only about 10% of them had a criminal record in the United States. The legality of many deportations is highly questionable, as the White House has defied court orders to turn back deportation planes and return wrongly deported people back to the United States

According to the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse, founded at Syracuse University, ICE issued 18,000 “detainer” requests for local, state, and federal law enforcement agencies to hold people for possible deportation in the first month of the new Trump administration. That was more than triple the detainers issued in the first full month of the Biden administration, which faced its own fierce criticism from immigration rights advocates.

ICE says detainers are mostly for people who have been convicted of burglaries and robberies, kidnapping, homicide, sexual assault, weapons offenses, drug trafficking, and human trafficking. But only 28% of people targeted by a detainer in the first month of the new Trump administration had a prior conviction in the United States, with the most frequent offenses involving drunk driving and other traffic violations.

As for the “worst of the worst,” just one half of 1% of detainers involved a convicted rapist or murderer. So far, all that the government is proving is how cruel it is in running roughshod over due process to separate children from parents and deport U.S. citizen children, including one with late-stage cancer.

That the nation would spend $45 billion on this malicious ruination of lives and destruction of families looks even more unconscionable when President Trump and Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. want to cut $40 billion from a department that says its mission is to “enhance the health and well-being of all Americans, by providing for effective health and human services and by fostering sound, sustained advances in the sciences underlying medicine, public health, and social services.”

A review of the proposed cuts—as detailed in a 64-page memorandum that was leaked to the media—shows how profoundly the Trump administration is about to betray that mission.

Cuts Despite Deadly Toll

The administration would end the HIV Epidemic Initiative, even though nearly 5,000 people a year in the United States still die with HIV/AIDS as the underlying cause. Despite many advances in HIV treatment that allow patients longer lives, there were still 38,000 HIV diagnoses in 2022, half of them in Southern states. While 1 in 5 people in the United States with HIV are still not able to access treatment.

The administration would kill the Minority AIDS Initiative, even though the disease is rife with gross racial disparities. Though African Americans are 12% of the nation’s population, they accounted for 37% of new HIV diagnoses in 2022.

The cuts would eliminate the division of Firearm Injury and Mortality Research. In doing so, the administration is imposing an ignorance that will likely further paralyze any debate on gun control, since the division’s mission is to provide data “to inform action” on a major cause of death in the United States. Last year, then-Surgeon General Vivek Murthy issued an advisory declaring gun violence an “urgent public health crisis,” as gun deaths soared to a record 48,830 in 2021.

All this raises real questions of how people in this nation could needlessly die if the HHS cuts become real in the areas of gun safety, mental health, food safety, HIV, or nursing.

New research funded by HHS’s Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) found that emergency rooms were receiving a gunshot victim every 30 minutes in nine Southern and Western states and the District of Columbia. Even though murders have subsided somewhat from a record 21,000 in 2021 during the Covid-19 crisis, gun suicides kept rising to a record 27,300 in 2023.

Yet, HHS has scrubbed Murthy’s advisory from its website.

The Youth Violence Division would also be eliminated, even though gun deaths are the leading cause of death for youth under 18, killing 2,500 kids a year. Due to the Trump administration’s demands to end equity across all public policy, HHS proposes to eliminate the National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities. More than half of Black youth who die before the age of 18 are victims of gun violence, according to the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Violence Solutions. Black youth are six times more likely to die a gun death than white youth.

Besides the 27,300 gun suicides in 2023, another 22,000 suicides occurred that year from other methods, primarily suffocation and intentional poisoning. About another 100,000 people died in 2022 from unintentional overdoses of fentanyl, methamphetamine, prescription opioids, cocaine, heroin, and other substances.Yet, despite the approximately 150,000 combined deaths a year from suicides and overdoses, President Trump and Secretary Kennedy propose to eliminate dozens of mental health and substance abuse training and treatment programs for children, families, people of color, people in the criminal justice system, first responders, community recovery support, and crisis response.

As if the Flint Water Crisis never happened, HHS under the Trump administration would end the Childhood Lead Poisoning Program and the Lead Exposure Registry. That is despite a 2022 study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) journal that showed half of the U.S. population was exposed to high levels of lead in early childhood, and a 2016 Reutersanalysis that 3,000 communities across the nation had higher lead levels than Flint. A 2022 study found that without stronger congressional action to protect children from the brain damage of lead exposure, the nation will “needlessly absorb” about $80 billion in annual costs to the nation’s economy, double the proposed cuts to HHS.

HHS would end the direct involvement of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in routine inspections of food facilities, trusting an uneven patchwork of state vigilance on bacteria, parasites, and viruses in our food systems. Never mind that the CDC says there are 48 million cases of foodborne illness every year, costing 3,000 lives and requiring 128,000 hospitalizations. A study last year done by researchers from U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and the Colorado School of Public Health found that food illnesses cost the nation $75 billion a year in medical care, lost productivity, premature deaths, and ongoing chronic illnesses.

Yet, HHS wants to cut $40 billion from the budget.

Cuts Range From Chronic Diseases to Drowning Programs

The Trump administration and his so-called Department of Government Efficiency, led by Elon Musk, have disingenuously stated that funding and eliminations of departments are targeting waste and fraud. One need not be a math major to see that what they propose is the opposite.

For instance, the cuts would eliminate the National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion, even though cancer, heart disease, and stroke kill more than 1.5 million people a year in the United States, and cost the nation hundreds of billions of dollars a year in healthcare costs and lost productivity. Many of those diseases, along with diabetes and obesity, are often preventable, and the national center has been a resource for programs to reduce smoking, promote physical activity, lower alcohol intake, and improve nutrition.

The administration wants to eliminate the National Institutes for Nursing Research and several other nursing programs. This is in the face of studies that show that lower nurse-to-patient ratios and lower patient waiting times (because of more nurses) can save a hospital a couple of million dollars a year. It is also in the face of a 2021 study that found that in New York state alone, lower nurse-to-patient ratios could save more than 4,000 lives and more than $700 million over a two-year period.

The administration is so heartless that it even wants to eliminate its program for drowning, even though 4,500 people a year perish underwater, even though it is the top cause of death for preschoolers, and even though 55% of U.S. adults have never taken a swim lesson.

All this raises real questions of how people in this nation could needlessly die if the HHS cuts become real in the areas of gun safety, mental health, food safety, HIV, or nursing. It should be unfathomable that the nation would let its guard down after Flint, risking stunted brain development in untold children.

For these $40 billion-worth of cuts to come at the same time our government wants to spend $45 billion to become Amazon-efficient at shipping human beings “all over the globe” to foreign prisons is establishing this nation as a beacon of cruelty in the developed world. The government wants a conveyor belt of deportation as it dismantles health systems in the name of efficiency.

That would be quite the fulfillment center. Immigrants are forklifted into misery. The rest of us are being carted into a cavalier world by a government that clearly does not care how many people die.

Even Dems Who Initially Backed Crypto GENIUS Act Block It Over 'Outstanding Issues'

"Democrats held firm against this corporate power grab. We're fighting for fairness, not billionaire greed!" said Our Revolution —though the effort to pass the bill is not over.


Advertisement featuring U.S. President Donald Trump 

with Bitcoin in Hong Kong on Sunday, April 6, 2025.
(Photo: May James/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images)

Jessica Corbett
May 09, 2025
COMMON DREAMS

In a win for progressive groups and lawmakers who have been sounding the alarm about legislation that would create a regulatory framework for stablecoins, the U.S. Senate Democratic Caucus—along with a couple of Republicans—blocked the cryptocurrency bill from advancing on Thursday in a 49-48 procedural vote.

A stablecoin is a digital asset whose value is tied to traditional currency, such as the U.S. dollar, or a commodity like gold. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) co-sponsored the Guiding and Establishing National Innovation for U.S. Stablecoins (GENIUS) Act, which advanced out of the Senate Banking Committee in March with support from five other Democrats.

Meanwhile, the committee's ranking member, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), has blasted the bill—as has Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), who caucuses with Democrats and warned this week that the GENIUS Act would make it easier for President Donald Trump "and his family to continue to engage in corrupt dealmaking enabled through their cryptocurrency."

Our Revolution, a group formed as a continuation of Sanders' 2016 presidential campaign, has similarly panned the legislation, with executive director Joseph Geevarghese calling it a "laughably weak and toothless regulatory bill—a sham crafted by cryptocurrency giants that is certain to line the pockets of the Trump family's crypto empire."

Concern over the bill has grown since the revelation last week that a stablecoin developed by the Trump family crypto firm, World Liberty Financial, would be used for a $2 billion deal between an investment firm established by the government of Abu Dhabi, MGX, and the world's largest crypto exchange, Binance.



In recent days, several crypto-friendly Democrats said they couldn't support the GENIUS Act in its current form, and ultimately, no members of the party's caucus voted for it. Thursday's vote was welcomed by Our Revolution, which said on social media that "Democrats held firm against this corporate power grab. We're fighting for fairness, not billionaire greed!"

Gillibrand, a key target of Our Revolution ahead of the vote, said in a statement that "I believe it is essential to the future of the U.S. economy and to everyday Americans that we enact strict stablecoin regulations and consumer protections where none currently exist. Over the past few years, I have worked in good faith with Republicans to author robust stablecoin legislation that protects consumers, enables innovation to thrive, and maintains the dominance of the U.S. dollar."

"The bipartisanship of this effort was on display when the bill passed out of the Banking Committee with strong support from Democrats and Republicans," she continued. "However, developments over the past week made it clear that there were a number of outstanding issues that needed to be addressed before this bill could pass the full Senate."

"I fully support my colleagues' efforts," Gillibrand said, specifically applauding Sen. Bill Hagerty (R-Tenn.) "for his tireless work across the aisle to improve and strengthen this bill." She added that "I remain extremely confident and hopeful that very soon we can finish the job."

According toAxios: "Key Senate players have been meeting all week, trying to land a deal to appease Democrats. Senate Republicans reviewed Democrats' proposed changes to the GENIUS Act, with Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) and Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.) negotiating up until the last minute."

Warner, one of the Democrats who voted the bill out of committee in March, said in a Thursday statement that "while we've made meaningful progress on the GENIUS Act, the work is not yet complete, and I simply cannot in good conscience ask my colleagues to vote for this legislation when the text isn't yet finished."

"I remain fully committed to getting this right," he said. "I plan to continue working with my colleagues to strengthen this legislation and move it forward in a way that promotes innovation while protecting the interests of the American people. It is my sincere hope that we can start floor consideration next week after we have finalized our work and given our colleagues adequate time to review."

While Thune reposted social media statements from his GOP colleagues expressing disappointment over the result and accusing Democrats of "hypocrisy," he also signaled that the effort to pass a stablecoin bill will continue by changing his vote from yes to no, which enables him to bring up the GENIUS Act at a later date.



Given expectations that the fight for the bill will go on, Democrats are still pushing for key reforms and additions. Citing recent reporting about Trump agreeing to attend a dinner with major investors in his cryptocurrency, Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) said on social media Friday that "access to the White House shouldn't be up for sale to the highest bidder!!"

"This kind of blatant corruption takes a sledgehammer to public trust—we need to add my End Crypto Corruption Act to the GENIUS Act NOW!" added Merkley, pushing legislation that would ban the president, vice president, top executive branch officials, members of Congress, and their immediate families from issuing, endorsing, or sponsoring crypto assets.

Progressive Group Rebukes Democrats for Being 'Fully Complicit' in Industry-Backed Crypto Bill

The head of Our Revolution called the GENIUS Act "a sham crafted by cryptocurrency giants that is certain to line the pockets of the Trump family's crypto empire."

Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) speaks onstage during the 2025 TIME100 Summit at Jazz at Lincoln Center on April 23, 2025 in New York City.
(Photo: Jemal Countess/Getty Images for TIME)

Eloise Goldsmith
May 07, 2025
COMMON DREAMS

As the Senate is reportedly poised to hold a Thursday procedural vote on legislation that would create a regulatory framework for a type of cryptocurrency called stablecoin, the group Our Revolution released a statement Wednesday denouncing Democrats for being "complicit" in the bill, which they say will likely enrich U.S. President Donald Trump.

Joseph Geevarghese, executive director of Our Revolution, said in a Wednesday statement that the Guiding and Establishing National Innovation for U.S. Stablecoins (GENIUS) Act is a "laughably weak and toothless regulatory bill—a sham crafted by cryptocurrency giants that is certain to line the pockets of the Trump family's crypto empire." Our Revolution is a progressive political organizing group launched as a continuation of Sen. Bernie Sanders' (I-Vt.) 2016 presidential campaign.

"Let's be clear," Geevarghese continued, "Democrats are fully complicit in the grift, with Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) leading the charge as the bill's original sponsor. We call on every senator who still gives a damn about democracy to shut down this outright sellout to the cryptocurrency industry."

Common Dreams reached out to Gillibrand's office for comment.

The bipartisan bill was originally co-sponsored by Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.), Sen. Cynthia Lummis (R-Wyo.), and Gillibrand. Later, Sen. Angela Alsobooks (D-Md.) became a co-sponsor as well.

The GENIUS Act, which is backed by the crypto industry, would make it easier for U.S. firms to do business in stablecoin, according to the The New York Times.

Several other crypto-friendly Democrats in the Senate had backed the GENIUS Act, but over the weekend pulled their support, citing a desire for stronger provisions on anti-money laundering, national security, and other issues. "While we are eager to continue working with our colleagues to address these issues, we would be unable to vote for cloture should the current version of the bill come to the floor," wrote the group, which did not include Alsobrooks and Gillibrand, in a statement on Saturday.

A spokesperson for Alsobrooks toldThe American Prospect on Monday that at the Senate Banking Committee markup, "Democrats received commitments to address concerns about the bill. Those commitments should be honored, and she supports her colleagues in their efforts to further improve the bill."

The bill may need as many as 10 Democrats to clear a procedural vote due to potential defections on the GOP side, according to Axios.

Meanwhile, on Tuesday, Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) unveiled the End Crypto Corruption Act, a proposal that would bar the president, vice president, members of Congress, and their immediate families from issuing digital assets, like stablecoins. Gillibrand has joined that bill as a co-sponsor.

Critics of the GENIUS Act, like Sanders and Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), warn it would facilitate illicit activity and undermine consumer protection. Sanders warned on Tuesday that the GENIUS Act "makes it easier for President Trump and his family to continue to engage in corrupt dealmaking enabled through their cryptocurrency, to the great benefit of themselves and their tech oligarch backers."

Democratic lawmakers have voiced concern about a recent Trump crypto revelation—that a stablecoin created by the Trump-affiliated World Liberty Financial crypto venture will be used to complete a $2 billion transaction by an Emirati-state owned investment firm.

And while some reporting suggests that Trump's crypto maneuvers are actually harming the chances that the GENIUS Act will pass, Public Citizen co-president Lisa Gilbert said Wednesday that "all available signs point to Donald Trump trading deregulation of the crypto industry in exchange for personal and political enrichment."

"Crypto helped elect Trump, and now they are helping him add millions to his personal bank account," Gilbert added.

'Appalling and Lawless': Trump Moves to Fire Democrats on Consumer Safety Panel

"I'll see him in court," said Richard Trumka Jr., one of the commissioners.


Consumer Product Safety Comission member Richard Trumka Jr. was photographed at the agency's headquarters on January 20, 2023 in Bethesda, Maryland.
(Photo: Ricky Carioti/The Washington Post via Getty Images)

Jake Johnson
May 09, 2025
COMMON DREAMS

Three Democratic members of the Consumer Product Safety Commission vowed on Friday to fight back after U.S. President Donald Trump moved to fire them, an effort that the trio described as part of the White House's unlawful assault on independent agencies.

Mary Boyle, Richard Trumka Jr., and Alex Hoehn-Saric are now listed on the CPSC's website as "former commissioners." The Washington Post reported that Trump moved to fire the commissioners "shortly after" the Elon Musk-led Department of Government Efficiency visited the agency on Thursday.

"The Democratic commissioners objected to two DOGE employees being formally detailed to the agency," the Post noted, citing Trumka's account.

Boyle and Trumka said they received emails from the White House late Thursday informing them of the president's bid to remove them from their posts. Hoehn-Saric said in a statement Friday that while he has yet to receive communication from the White House, the acting chair of the CPSC is "preventing me from executing my duties as commissioner based on an assertion that the president is also seeking my removal."

"The illegal attempt to remove me from the CPSC happened immediately after my colleagues and I took steps to advance our safety work and protect our staff from arbitrary firings," said Hoehn-Saric. "President Trump's action politicizes a critical independent public safety agency that was structured by law to avoid such interference."

All three of the Democratic commissioners indicated that they don't intend to leave the agency quietly, following in the footsteps of commissioners at other agencies who have challenged Trump's attempts to fire them, setting the stage for a high-stakes battle at the U.S. Supreme Court.



Trumka, son of the late labor leader Richard Trumka, said Friday that he has "a set term on this independent, bipartisan commission that does not expire until October of 2028." Last week, Trumka defied a Trump executive order instructing federal agencies to submit all proposed rules to the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs for review.

"I will continue protecting the American people from harm through that time," Trumka continued. "The president would like to end this nation's long history of independent agencies, so he's chosen to ignore the law and pretend independence doesn't exist. I'll see him in court."

Boyle, whose term was set to expire later this year, also signaled that she intends to remain at her post.

"Until my term as commissioner concludes,” Boyle said, "I will insist on following these time-tested principles, and I will use my voice to speak out on behalf of safety."

Consumer advocates voiced outrage in response to Trump's attempt to fire the CPSC commissioners.

"The illegal firing of CPSC commissioners is not just a brazen, unprecedented, and reckless assault on the rule of law, it is a direct threat to the lives and physical safety of Americans, especially our most vulnerable, infants and children," saidCourtney Griffin, Director of Consumer Product Safety at the Consumer Federation of America. "The consequences may be measured in preventable injuries, hospitalizations, and lives lost."

William Wallace, director of safety advocacy for Consumer Reports, said in a statement that "this is an appalling and lawless attack on the independence of our country's product safety watchdog."

"Anyone who cares about keeping their family safe should oppose this move and demand that it be reversed," Wallace added. "This isn't really about the individual leaders, as commendable as they are. It's about whether Congress can maintain a federal agency that takes strong action to protect the public, based on scientific evidence and insulated from political whims."

Democrats' Bill Would Extend Social Security and Medicare Solvency 'As Far as the Eye Can See'

BENEFITS, PAID FOR BY AMERIKANS,

NOT ENTITLEMENTS

"Working-class seniors pay into Social Security and Medicare their whole careers so they can enjoy a dignified retirement, but they end up paying a much larger share of their income in taxes than billionaires because the tax code is rigged in favor of the rich."


U.S. Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) speaks at a press conference hosted by the Climate Action Campaign outside of the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C. on April 9, 2025.
(Photo: Bryan Dozier/Middle East Images/AFP via Getty Images)

Julia Conley
May 09, 2025
COMMON DREAMS

Social Security and Medicare protect tens of millions of American senior citizens from poverty and medical bankruptcy each year, but economic justice advocates have long said the programs would be strengthened and remain fully solvent for as long as possible if the richest Americans contributed more to them—and on Thursday two Democratic lawmakers introduced legislation to ensure they do.

The bicameral bill, the Medicare and Social Security Fair Share Act, was reintroduced by Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) and Rep. Brendan Boyle (D-Pa.), with the aim of requiring people with yearly incomes of more than $400,000 to contribute a fairer share of their wealth to the two programs.

Currently the maximum amount of earnings for which American workers must pay Social Security taxes is just over $176,000.

The bill would lift the Social Security tax cap "to ensure that no matter the source of their income, high-income taxpayers would pay the same tax rate on their income exceeding that threshold," said the lawmakers in a press statement.

It would also increase the Medicare tax rate for income above $400,000 by 1.2% and include a provision ensuring owners of hedge funds and private equity firms can no longer avoid Medicare taxes.

Whitehouse and Boyle introduced the bill as the Trump administration and congressional Republicans work to slash Social Security—confirming Wall Street executive Frank Bisignano, who has backed billionaire Elon Musk's spending cuts at the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), to run the program this week.

"While Republicans are pushing a $7 trillion tax giveaway to the ultrarich, we're working to protect the benefits that millions of Americans have earned—and we won't let them be stolen to fund another billionaire windfall."

Republicans have also suggested Medicare could be slashed in order to pay for tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans and have pushed to expand privatized Medicare Advantage plans.

"Working-class seniors pay into Social Security and Medicare their whole careers so they can enjoy a dignified retirement, but they end up paying a much larger share of their income in taxes than billionaires because the tax code is rigged in favor of the rich," said Whitehouse. "As the Trump administration and Congressional Republicans gear up to deliver budget-busting giveaways for their billionaire donors, I will continue pushing to make our tax code fair and protect these twin pillars of retirement security as far as the eye can see."

Actuaries at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services and Social Security Administration estimated that Whitehouse and Boyle's proposal would extend Social Security and Medicare solvency by at least 75 years.

Without new revenue, the trust funds that finance Medicare and Social Security are projected to be 100% solvent only through 2036 and 2033, respectively.

The legislation is endorsed by groups including Social Security Works, the National Council on Aging, and the Center for Medicare Advocacy.

"From my first day in Congress, I've pledged to protect the long-term stability of Social Security and Medicare—two bedrock promises our country made to seniors, workers, and people with disabilities," said Boyle. "Now, with [President] Donald Trump, Elon Musk, and DOGE-fueled billionaires openly attacking these programs, that fight is more urgent than ever."

"While Republicans are pushing a $7 trillion tax giveaway to the ultrarich," he said, "we're working to protect the benefits that millions of Americans have earned—and we won't let them be stolen to fund another billionaire windfall."

Scapegoating Wild Birds Won’t Solve Avian Flu: We Need Radical Farming Reform

As we reflect on the wonder of migratory birds, and the spotlight focuses on how our cities and communities can be made more bird-friendly, we must also consider how our food system is posing a threat to their very existence.


South Korean health officials inspect a rice field frequented by migrating birds in Seosan, 130 kilometers (78 miles) southwest of Seoul, on November 24, 2006.
(Photo: Jeon Young-Han/AFP via Getty Images)

Peter Stevenson
May 10, 2025

Common Dreams

For migratory and other wild birds, bird flu is a disaster. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, or CDC, states that 169 million U.S. poultry have been affected by highly pathogenic bird flu since January 2022. Yet worldwide, tens of millions of wild birds have died of bird flu—which has also spread to mammals, including over 1,000 US. dairy herds.

Saturday 10 May is World Migratory Bird Day, a global event for raising awareness of migratory birds and issues related to their conservation. The poultry industry and governments like to blame wild birds for bird flu. However, the Scientific Task Force on Avian Influenza and Wild Birds—which includes the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and the World Organization for Animal Health (WOAH) stresses that wild birds are in fact the victims of highly pathogenic bird flu; they do not cause it. As a recent study states, “This panzootic did not emerge from nowhere, but rather is the result of 20 years of viral evolution in the ever-expanding global poultry population.”

Until recently, the bird flu viruses that circulate naturally in wild birds were usually of low pathogenicity; they generally caused little harm to the birds. It is when it gets into industrial poultry sheds—often on contaminated clothing, feed, or equipment—that low pathogenic avian influenza can evolve into dangerous highly pathogenic avian influenza.

Governments worldwide appear to have no strategy for how to end these regular bird flu outbreaks other than to hope they will eventually die down.

Industrial poultry production, in which thousands of genetically similar, stressed birds are packed into a shed, gives a virus a constant supply of new hosts; it can move very quickly among the birds, perhaps mutating as it does so. In this situation, highly virulent strains can rapidly emerge. The European Food Safety Authority warns that it is important to guard against certain low pathogenic avian influenza subtypes entering poultry farms “as these subtypes are able to mutate into their highly pathogenic forms once circulating in poultry.”

Once highly pathogenic avian influenza strains have developed in poultry farms, they can then be carried back outside—for example, through the large ventilation fans used in intensive poultry operations—and spread to wild birds. The Scientific Task Force states that since the mid-2000s spillover of highly pathogenic bird flu from poultry to wild birds has occurred “on multiple occasions.”

So, low pathogenic bird flu is spread from wild birds to intensive poultry where it can mutate into highly pathogenic bird flu, which then spills over to wild birds and can even return back to poultry in a growing and continuing vicious circle.

Following its evolution in farmed poultry, the highly pathogenic virus has adapted to wild birds, meaning that it is circulating independently in wild populations, with some outbreaks occurring in remote areas that are distant from any poultry farms.
Is There a Health Risk for Humans?


While the health risk to humans from bird flu may be low, it cannot be ignored. Highly pathogenic avian influenza has spread to mammals including otters, foxes, seals, dolphins, sea lions, dogs, and bears. Worryingly, it has been found in a Spanish mink farm where it then was able to spread from one infected mink to another.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture has said that cow-to-cow transmission is a factor in the spread of bird flu in dairy herds. The ability for bird flu to move directly from one mammal to another is troubling as a pandemic could ensue if it could move directly from one human to another.

Scientists at Scripps Research reveal that a single mutation in the H5N1 virus that has recently infected U.S. dairy cows could enhance the virus’ ability to attach to human cells, potentially increasing the risk of passing from person to person.

A 2023 joint statement from the World Health Organization, the FAO, and WOAH stated that, while avian influenza viruses normally spread among birds, “the increasing number of H5N1 avian influenza detections among mammals—which are biologically closer to humans than birds are—raises concern that the virus might adapt to infect humans more easily.”

Some mammals may also act as mixing vessels, leading to the emergence of new viruses that could be more harmful.
Pigs as Mixing Vessels

Pigs can be infected by avian and human influenza viruses as well as swine influenza viruses. Pigs can act as mixing vessels in which these viruses can reassort (i.e. swap genes) and new viruses that are a mix of pig, bird, and human viruses can emerge. The U.S. CDC explains that if the resulting new virus infects humans and can spread easily from person to person, a flu pandemic can occur.
Need for a Coherent Strategy to End Bird Flu

Governments worldwide appear to have no strategy for how to end these regular bird flu outbreaks other than to hope they will eventually die down. There is no sign of this happening. Without an exit strategy we are likely to face repeated, devastating outbreaks of bird flu for years to come. We need an action plan to restructure the poultry and pig sectors to reduce their capacity for generating highly pathogenic diseases.

We need to:Move to a poultry sector with smaller flocks and lower stocking densities to give the birds more space. Transmission and amplification of bird flu would be much less likely in such conditions.

End the practice of clustering a large number of poultry farms close together in a particular area. Between-farm spread is a major contributor to the transmission of highly pathogenic bird flu.

End the use of birds genetically selected for very fast growth. Such birds have impaired immune systems making them more susceptible to disease.

In light of pigs’ capacity for acting as mixing vessels for human, avian, and swine influenza viruses, the pig sector too needs to be restructured to make it less vulnerable to the transmission and amplification of influenza viruses. As with poultry, this would involve reducing stocking densities, smaller group sizes, and avoiding concentrating large numbers of farms in a particular area.

As we reflect on the wonder of migratory birds, and the spotlight focuses on how our cities and communities can be made more bird-friendly, we must also consider how our food system is posing a threat to their very existence. Failure to rethink industrial farming leaves us vulnerable, with the continued devastation of wild birds and poultry, and perhaps even a human pandemic.

Peter Stevenson is the chief policy adviser of Compassion in World Farming.
Full Bio >