{"id":155543,"date":"2026-02-08T00:46:08","date_gmt":"2026-02-08T00:46:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/155543\/"},"modified":"2026-02-08T00:46:08","modified_gmt":"2026-02-08T00:46:08","slug":"flesh-eating-parasite-sparks-disaster-declaration-in-texas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/155543\/","title":{"rendered":"Flesh-eating parasite sparks disaster declaration in Texas"},"content":{"rendered":"

Texas will not get screwed by the flesh-eating parasite known as the screwworm \u2014 with Gov. Greg Abbott declaring a preemptive disaster declaration before the devastating organism even gets to the Lone Star State.<\/p>\n

The New World Screwworm, a fly which can burrow into and feed on living tissue, has been steadily making its way north from Central and Southern America, officials said. <\/p>\n

\u201cState law authorizes me to act to prevent a threat of infestation that could cause severe damage to Texas property, and I will not wait for such harm to reach our livestock and wildlife,\u201d Abbott said<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"screwwormThe screwworm can devastate livestock, officials said. AP<\/p>\n

The blowflies primarily affect animals, experts said.<\/p>\n

And while human cases are rare, they can be terrifying.<\/p>\n

Doctors ended up surgically removing 100 to 150 screwworms<\/a> from a cancer patient in Florida last year, after the man apparently contracted the bug during a week-long visit to the Dominican Republic.<\/p>\n

There were so many larvae, the bugs clogged the hospital\u2019s suction machine<\/a>, the hospital said. <\/p>\n

There have been more than a dozen cases of the screwworm in Tamaulipas, Mexico, a town just south of the Texas border, Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller confirmed in January.\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n

Miller urged ranchers to remain vigilant. <\/p>\n

\u201cNow is the time for Texas producers to stay sharp and be prepared\u2026 Early detection is our strongest weapon,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

Abbott is also ordering state agencies to gear up before the parasite arrives, directing the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department and the Texas Animal Health Commission to form a joint New World Screwworm Response Team.<\/p>\n

\"aLivestock are particularly vulnerable to screwworm, officials said. DANIEL SANCHEZ\/EPA\/Shutterstock<\/p>\n

A $750 million facility is already in the works<\/a> to breed hundreds of millions of sterile screwworm flies \u2014 part of a proven strategy to stop the insects from reproducing.<\/p>\n

The method, last used in the 1960s, involves releasing lab-raised sterile male flies to mate with wild females, preventing them from laying viable eggs, officials said.<\/p>\n

The massive facility is slated to be built in Edinburg, just over the border. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Texas will not get screwed by the flesh-eating parasite known as the screwworm \u2014 with Gov. Greg Abbott…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":155544,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[17951,18376,27,29,28,734,64133],"class_list":{"0":"post-155543","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-texas","8":"tag-disaster","9":"tag-livestock","10":"tag-texas","11":"tag-texas-headlines","12":"tag-texas-news","13":"tag-us-news","14":"tag-worms"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/155543","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=155543"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/155543\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/155544"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=155543"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=155543"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=155543"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}