TPWD outlines multi‑agency plan as New World screwworm outbreaks rise in Mexico

The Texas Parks and Wildlife Department told commissioners on Nov. 5 that the New World screwworm — a parasitic fly whose larvae bore into living tissue of warm‑blooded animals — remains a credible threat to livestock, wildlife and the state's agricultural economy if it spreads north from recent outbreaks in Mexico.

Alan Kane, division director for the wildlife division, told the commission that the fly is endemic in parts of the Caribbean and South America and that recent detections in Nuevo Lef3n, Mexico (one near Sabinas Hidalgo and one southeast of Monterrey) involved single animals quickly treated and classified as inactive. Kane said controlling established infestations takes time and that early detection is critical.

Kane summarized the sterile‑insect technique, the eradication method historically used in the United States: pupa are irradiated to produce sterile adult males, which are…