Just when we may comfortably assemble with friends and family to eat comfort foods, sky-high prices threaten our Thanksgiving plans.
This year's turkey pricing is due to avian flu. A unusual outbreak of bird illness might hike Thanksgiving staple costs.
Since July 14, ten outbreaks of avian flu have affected more than 600,000 birds. Bird flu doesn't usually spread in warmer weather.
Food Dive estimates that the avian flu killed 5.4 million turkeys between January and July, or 2.5% of all turkeys slaughtered last year.
Jennie-O Turkey Store "took extraordinary efforts to preserve the health of its supply chain turkeys," the business said in a statement confirming the avian flu was identified in one Minnesota plant.
First diagnosed in Indiana in February, avian flu has spread to 24 states.
This affects Thanksgiving? Hormel Foods, one of the country's largest turkey processors, predicts supply constraints in the first quarter of 2023.
Lower industry-wide turkey supplies should keep prices high.