DES MOINES, Iowa (The Adobo Chronicles) – While some New Yorkers  have signed a petition demanding a Filipino restaurant in Manhattan to strike off balut from its menu, states like Iowa, Wisconsin and Minnesota have increased their quota for the importation of this Filipino delicacy.  Balut is a boiled duck embryo popular as a street food in the Philippines.

Iowa became the third state to declare an emergency response to a fast-expanding U.S. bird-flu outbreak on Friday as the national poultry death toll climbed toward record levels.

Officials in Iowa, the biggest egg-producing state, said they had identified four more suspected cases of avian influenza, and the likely number of birds affected in the state is now more than 16 million. Iowa Gov. Terry Branstad declared a state of emergency, the same move that was made last month by his counterparts in Wisconsin and Minnesota.

Branstad said the state government is doing all it can to ensure that Iowans get their recommended daily intake of dairy, consistent with the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s nutrition guide, My Plate, which recommends the amount of daily foods that Americans should consume for a healthy life.

“We are asking Iowans to eat  balut instead of chicken or eggs during this period of emergency to ensure both their safety and their nutritional health,” Branstad said.