The Canadian Food Inspection Agency shot and killed more than 300 ostriches at a remote farm in British Columbia after the country's top court declined to hear an appeal to save the flock in a case that drew worldwide attention, even from top Trump administration officials.
The agency had been trying to euthanize the flock since H5N1, a type of avian flu, was detected on the farm last winter.
Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said the order to kill the birds amounted to government overreach and urged Canadian authorities not to kill the birds but to do further testing to try to better understand the virus.
"We believe significant scientific knowledge may be garnered from following the ostriches in a controlled environment," Kennedy said in a May letter to the head of the agency.
Dr. Mehmet Oz, who heads the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, offered to relocate the doomed birds to his 900-acre ranch in Florida.
"The Canadians should stop putting their heads in the sand," Oz said.
"We just have to get [the ostriches] out of Canada. It doesn't help anyone to kill all the birds.
"It's not just about ostriches. It's about all the birds," he added.
"I'd rather the scientists make the determination — not bureaucrats.
"We found out what happened during the COVID pandemic, when the bureaucrats made all the decisions," Oz said.
John Catsimatidis, a billionaire Republican businessman and owner of a New York City radio station, on his radio program demanded "truth, justice, and the American way for the ostriches up in British Columbia."
Universal Ostrich Farms Inc. went to court to save the birds, but the Supreme Court of Canada dismissed the appeal Thursday morning.
"They made a mistake. These animals aren't poultry," Katie Pasitney, daughter of farm owner Karen Pasitney, told the Daily Mail.
"Some of them were 35 years old, and every single one had a name.
"My mom lost everything she loved. Those birds were all that kept her happy," she said.
"They killed all her babies, and now they're still lying there under a tarp."
Universal Ostrich Farms has bred the birds since the mid-1990s.
They were first reared to be slaughtered but in recent years the farm shifted its focus to using ostrich eggs for research, partnering with scientists to study the birds and their immune systems.
Solange Reyner ✉
Solange Reyner is a writer and editor for Newsmax. She has more than 15 years in the journalism industry reporting and covering news, sports and politics.
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