U.S. Customs and Border Patrol agents in El Paso, Texas have encountered more than 90 people trying to bring eggs from Mexico across the U.S. border since January, a CBP news release said Friday. The agency doled out 16 civil penalties amounting to nearly $4,000 in fines.

The rate of attempts to illegally bring eggs across the border has escalated in the past year. Between October 2024 and February 2025, the number of eggs detained at U.S. ports of entry was 29% higher than it was in the period the year before, a CBP spokesperson told Fortune.

The hike in egg smuggling rates coincides with U.S. egg prices reaching record highs last month—costing $4.95 for a dozen large Grade A eggs compared to the record $4.82 set the year before—as bird flu rips through American poultry farms. Since 2022, more than 166,000 flocks and 1,000 dairy cow herds have been affected by the H5N1 avian flu, according to the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention. As a result, more than 23 million egg-laying hens were slaughtered last month alone.

The weakened supply of eggs combined with sustained demand has not only driven up prices, but also forced some restaurants to implement surcharges on the breakfast staple. Some grocery stores are setting limits on how many eggs customers can purchase or selling them in smaller quantities like “loosie” cigarettes.

The U.S. has generally banned the import of fresh or raw eggs because of concern over avian influenza, according to CBP. Travelers are also prohibited from bringing live birds or raw poultry across the U.S. border. While most of border control’s confiscations come from travelers who declared bringing in the poultry products and were therefore not punished, some who don’t declare and are found with banned items can be fined.

How the Trump administration is addressing bird flu

Despite President Donald Trump’s promise to bring down prices on “day one” of his second term, the cost of eggs is likely not going to fall anytime soon.

Instead, public-health experts are concerned the administration’s mass firings and bureaucratic overhaul may have jeopardized efforts to stop the spread of H5N1 in American farms. Last week, the U.S. Department of Agriculture scrambled to rehire employees working to address the spread of bird flu it had fired the weekend before. The Trump administration also temporarily halted the CDC and USDA from holding Congressional briefings, meeting with state officials, or receiving internal reports, according to multiple reports.

Government organizations like the USDA are the country’s primary means of disease surveillance and are crucial in containing animal-borne diseases, according to Jennifer Nuzzo, director of the pandemic center at the Brown University School of Public Health, who spoke to Fortune earlier this month.

“Everybody knows about the price of eggs. Everybody knows how hard it is to even find eggs in the grocery store,” Nuzzo said. “Understanding how H5N1 is affecting animal populations is essential for protecting our agricultural interests.”

While historically the U.S. has turned to “depopulation” efforts, or the mass culling of flocks, to stop bird flu spread, it may finally be changing its strategy. The USDA approved a conditional license for an H5N2 bird flu vaccine that would also combat the H5N1 variant of the disease. The vaccine has not yet been approved for commercial use.

As a short-term solution, the Trump administration has enlisted the help of Turkey, which will export 420 million eggs to the U.S. this year. However, the assistance may not prove useful in addressing the egg crisis at its source.

“While this is enough to offset some production losses,” Bernt Nelson, an economist at the American Farm Bureau Federation, told CNN, “it won’t provide much support if [the bird flu] continues at its current pace.”