A travel-related screwworm infection was confirmed in Maryland in a person who recently returned from El Salvador, with CDC confirmation dated August 4. Screwworms remain endemic in parts of South America and the Caribbean, and travel-related human cases have periodically appeared in the United States. The immediate risk to public health in the US from this single introduction is very low, but the risk of an incursion at the US-Mexico border has increased. A prior eradication effort using sterile-male releases created a biological barrier at the Darién Gap, but that barrier was breached in 2022 and flies have moved north toward Texas.
Flesh-eating screwworm larvae poised to invade the US have snuck into Maryland via the flesh of a person who had recently traveled to El Salvador, upping anxiety about the ghastly-and economically costly-parasite. Reuters was first to report the case early Monday, quoting Andrew Nixon, spokesperson for the US Department of Health and Human Services, who said in an email that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention had confirmed the case on August 4 in a person who had returned from a trip to El Salvador.
While other outlets have since reported that the screwworm case found in Maryland is the first human case in the US, or first travel-related case in the US, or the first case in years -none of those things are true. Screwworms are endemic in parts of South America and the Caribbean and travel-related cases have always been a threat and occasionally pop up in the US.
Screwworms were once endemic to the US before a massive eradication effort that began in the 1950s drove the population out of the US and Central America. The flies were held at bay with a biological barrier of constant releases of sterile male flies along the Darién Gap at the border of Panama and Colombia. The flies were declared eradicated from Panama in 2006.
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