26.12.2024

The U.S. Department of Agriculture's (USDA) Center for Veterinary Biologics (CVB) and the Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) have issued a notice to inform veterinary biologics manufacturers of FSIS's interest in Salmonella vaccines for poultry.
This interest arises from a proposed regulatory frame work for Salmonella in raw poultry products, released in August 2024. Currently, vaccination is the only method capable of targeting specific Salmonella serotypes, making vaccines a vital part of USDA-FSIS's strategy for controlling Salmonella.
In its efforts to reduce cases of human salmonellosis linked to raw poultry, FSIS has taken steps to eliminate obstacles to the use of vaccination as a pre-harvest intervention. Since April 1, 2024, FSIS has excluded specific commercial vaccine subtypes found in FSIS raw poultry samples from the calculations used to categorize establishments based on the raw poultry Salmonella performance standards.
FSIS is eager to learn about and engage in discussions with veterinary biologics manufacturers regarding vaccination technologies, particularly modified-live vaccines that target FSIS's proposed serotypes of public health concern or their associated serogroups.
The relevance of live vaccines in broilers is not clearly understood, particularly given that the persistence of the vaccine strain in the tissues of vaccinated birds is significantly prolonged when properly evaluated at the time of slaughter.