You are wrong. The beef industry alone has remained amazingly consistent over the past 20 years, only varying about 2% in the billions of pounds of meat produced. The problem however is that the price per pound for the American consumer has more that doubled in that same amount of time.

Cattle herds are hurting, and inventory is low largely due to the near constant drought conditions in Texas, the largest producer in the US. This is a perceptual loss however as # of head slaughtered has remained steady over the same amount of time, the herds are growing in more drought resistant areas like Montana and Colorado., Even some of the historically low producers like Iowa and Illinois are producing more beef than the would normally.

Also, the amount of chickens destroyed due to bird flu is only something you know about because they report on it more. Birds have been destroyed by the barnful forever in the poultry business due to the way the birds are raised in high density areas. An infection of any type can wipe out a flock in nothing flat.