The discovery of a New World screwworm infection in Texas has raised urgent questions about the Trump administration's 'Make America Great Again' agenda and whether federal budget cuts played a role in the parasite's return to American soil.
The New World screwworm, a flesh-eating parasite officially eradicated from the United States in 1966, was recently detected in a three-week-old calf near La Pryor, Texas, roughly 30 miles from the Mexican border.
The finding prompted an emergency response from the US Department of Agriculture (USDA), which has established a 20-km-wide containment zone, imposed livestock movement controls and expanded surveillance efforts in the affected region.
The US Department of Agriculture (USDA) has identified a second case of the flesh-eating screwworm fly in Texas, just days after a first occurrence in a one-year-old calf triggered an aggressive response to stem the parasite's spread in the leading cattle-producing state.
Federal officials are now relying heavily on the Sterile Insect Technique, a decades-old strategy that helped eradicate screwworms in the first place.
The USDA plans to dramatically increase production of sterile flies, potentially reaching 600 million per week, and has also deployed the USDA's 'Beagle Brigade' detection dogs and increased border inspections.
