The U.S. Department of Agriculture announced on Wednesday that the flesh-eating New World screwworm has been detected in Texas.
According to a statement from the USDA, the parasite was discovered in a three-week-old calf in Zavala County, Texas, after its larvae were found in the calf’s umbilical region.
To combat the infestation, the USDA is taking swift measures by designating a 12-mile “infested zone” surrounding the detection site. They are also enforcing quarantines, enhancing screwworm trapping along the border, and collaborating with the Texas Animal Health Commission through an Incident Command Team.
“The USDA has heavily invested in tools to combat NWS, especially after observing a rise in cases across Central America and Mexico. We successfully eradicated this pest in the past, and we are equipped to do so again,” stated Dudley Hoskins, USDA’s under secretary for marketing and regulatory programs.
Recently, a screwworm was identified in Mexico, just 25 miles from the U.S. border, marking the closest sighting to U.S. territory since last September, based on federal records.
Earlier on Wednesday, the USDA shared via social media that a sample from the Texas case had been dispatched to the USDA’s National Veterinary Services Laboratories in Ames, Iowa, for verification of the New World screwworm.
At least 26,216 screwworm cases have been identified across Mexico, and upward of 2,700 remain active, the USDA said.
New World screwworm maggots can infest livestock and other warm-blooded animals, including, in rare cases, people, according to the USDA. The parasitic fly lays its eggs in open wounds or orifices such as the eyes, ears, nose or mouth, which can then eat living tissue or flesh once they hatch, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The screwworms most often enter an animal through an open wound and feed on its living flesh.
The New World screwworm is typically found in South America and parts of the Caribbean, but over the last three years, it has been detected farther north in Central America and Mexico, the CDC said.
Last year, the first case of a New World screwworm infestation in a human was confirmed in the U.S., the Department of Health and Human Services announced at the time. The person had recovered, and investigators found no evidence of transmission to others or animals.
