The U.S. fought the flesh-eating screwworm for decades. Now it must begin again.

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June 7, 2026, 5:00 AM CDT
By Evan Bush

The United States spent more than half a century and hundreds of millions of dollars driving the flesh-eating New World screwworm as far from its borders as possible. Now, it’s back.The species can eat the tissue of any warm-blooded animal, but it’s a particular threat to livestock and is often fatal for cattle. Some environmentally minded bioethicists have openly debated whether it would be moral to deliberately drive the screwworm into extinction.

“There are some species that it’s worth considering wiping out altogether and I do think the screwworm is one,” said Gregory Kaebnick, a senior research scholar at the Hastings Center for Bioethics.

The Agriculture Department announced Wednesday that the New World screwworm had been found in a calf in Texas — the first detection in U.S. cattle during a natural incursion since 1982. The agency reported a second case Friday. It was discovered about six miles from the first infection. The discovery represents a worrisome comeback for the species and a failure in containment for the U.S., reprising a decadeslong battle the country waged once already.

Experts said the U.S. will run much the same playbook as it did starting in the late 1950s, when the government embarked on an aggressive, multinational fight against the screwworm. Because female screwworms only mate once, the strategy is to mass-produce sterile males and release them into the wild, where they serve as reproductive dead ends.

https://www.nbcnews.com/science/environment/flesh-eating-screw-worm-fight-plan-rcna348521

[efhmc]

1. Once again, science just might save us.

[EYESORE 9001]

2. Good science...maybe

Bad science is another thing, and this regime is hellbent on damaging our health.

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

3. Thanks to the ketamine kid.

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4. Actually the US stopped investing in this in 2004 because it was eradicated all the way to Panama.

But you can't stop dealing with it.

Regardless of the answer, the U.S. is investing once again. The USDA is spending $750 million to build a facility that will produce about 300 million sterile screwworms each week in Texas, which is about three times the amount possible today and similar to what could be produced in the 1960s. But the facility won’t be operational until late 2027 at the earliest, and it will take longer to produce at full volume.

Until the facility is online, the risk of an outbreak will be high. A widespread screwworm outbreak could cost the Texas economy alone about $1.8 billion a year because of livestock deaths, veterinary services, treatments and extra labor, according to USDA estimates from 2024.

While the goal will be to push screwworm out of the U.S. and Central America, some researchers think it’s worth considering getting rid of the species altogether. A group of bioethicists, conservation biologists and scientists gathered in 2024 to discuss whether it would make sense to tweak the sterilization technique and use genetic modification to ensure lethal genes spread into the screwworm’s gene pool to doom the species. The group published its perspective in the journal Science last year.