Soaring egg prices have consumers boiling, and on Wednesday, the United States Department of Agriculture blamed rising costs on the bird flu epidemic and said it will take new steps to quell the outbreak.

The U.S. will invest up to $1 billion to combat the spread of bird flu, as well as increase imports of eggs in an effort to drive down high prices, agriculture secretary Brooke Rollins said on Wednesday.

Iowa Secretary of Agriculture Mike Naig applauded the USDA’s updated response to bird flu, emphasizing that poultry producers in the state have been hit hard by the H5N1 virus. Over 11 million chickens and turkeys in Iowa were killed by the virus or culled to prevent its spread last year.