Making eggs for breakfast might become more challenging as the common grocery item is expected to become pricier throughout the year, despite Vice President JD Vance recently saying otherwise.

According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture's (USDA's) price outlook, egg prices are predicted to increase about 20% in 2025, compared to about 2.2% for overall food prices. The USDA attributed the rise in egg costs to the highly pathogenic avian influenza, or bird flu, outbreak,which has caused a strain in supply.

The price hike is not sudden, as eggs cost 36.8% more in December 2024 than in December 2023, but were still below peak prices from January 2023, according to the USDA. The outlook says retail egg prices climbed 8.4% in December 2024 and continued to experience volatile month-to-month changes.

Beef, coffee and orange juice are also expected to be higher in price in 2025, but none will rise to the degree of eggs, according to the USDA's price outlook. During an interview on CBS News’s “Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan," Vance said gas and grocery prices will come down at some point.

“Prices are going to come down, but it’s going to take a little bit of time,” Vance told Brennan in the interview that aired Sunday. “The president has been president for all of five days. I think that in those five days, he’s accomplished more than Joe Biden did in four years.”

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Here is what to know about the increasing egg prices and how they became so high.

How bad is the bird flu outbreak?

The bird flu outbreak strain, H5N1, emerged among poultry flocks and wild birds in Europe in the fall of 2020 before moving to the U.S., Africa, the Middle East and Asia. The disease has grown to become the largest such outbreak in the U.S.

The USDA Agricultural Marketing Service (AMS), reported on Jan. 3 that grocery stores were seeing record-high prices in retail markets nationwide due to the "significant outbreaks of highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) in commercial table egg layer flocks through December."

By Jan. 17, the virus had impacted more than 136 million poultry across 50 U.S. states since January 2022, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Due to the growing spread, infected birds have been selectively slaughtered across the U.S., sometimes even reaching millions at a single location.

While some states avoided last year's outbreaks, many have recently reported a resurgence of the virus, which the USDA reported killed about 17.2 million egg-laying hens in November and December. This accounted for nearly half of all birds killed by the virus in 2024, the federal department said.

How much did eggs cost a month ago?

With egg prices expected to rise, consumers could see a significant jump from December. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the average price of a dozen large, grade-A eggs was $4.15 in December, which was up from $3.65 in November.

Egg prices also shot up more than 36% year-over-year in December, according to the Consumer Price Index.

During Vance's interview, he said several of the executive orders signed by Trump will help drive prices down, adding that they “have caused, already, jobs to start coming back into our country, which is a core part of lowering prices.”

“More capital investment, more job creation in our economy, is one of the things that’s going to drive down prices for all consumers, but also raise wages so that people can afford to buy the things that they need,” the VP continued.

When will egg prices come back down?

It's unclear when the cost of eggs may return to a downward trend but it could be after 2025.

One of the main determiners of the egg prices will be farmers and producers, and how long it takes them to recover their stocks of healthy laying hens.

Supply and prices will stabilize only when farms and producers can recover their stock of healthy laying hens. The USDA forecasts table egg production going down in 2025, "reflecting a smaller laying flock as a result of losses to Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza (HPAI), as well as lower lay rates."

“No one can predict the future, but bird flu remains an ongoing threat to our egg farms, and egg farmers are working around the clock to protect their birds, replenish supply and keep those eggs coming," Emily Metz, president and CEO of the American Egg Board, told USA TODAY earlier this month. "On a positive note, she said, farmers have a lot more experience fighting the disease now, meaning farms are able to recover faster."

Contributing: Dinah Voyles Pulver, USA TODAY