Screwworm Count Reaches 47 as Val Verde County Confirms Second Case

The New World screwworm outbreak has added its 47th U.S. case—and Val Verde County's second in ten days. USDA's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service confirmed a goat infestation in the county on August 25, following the sheep case confirmed there on August 16.

Forty-six of the 47 U.S. cases are in Texas; the remaining case is the dog confirmed in Lea County, New Mexico, in early June. The two Val Verde detections are now the only cases nationwide still listed as active under mitigation—45 cases are inactive.

Quarantine upgraded to Infested Zone 19.A

The day after the goat case was confirmed, the Texas Animal Health Commission issued a modified Executive Director Order replacing its August 16 order and redesignating the area as Infested Zone 19.A, covering parts of Crockett, Sutton, and Val Verde counties.

The rules are unchanged in kind but now apply to the redrawn zone: warm-blooded animals may not leave without prior authorization, inspection, any required treatment and an official movement certificate, and hides, carcasses and animal parts must be inspected and treated before transport. Parts of 23 Texas counties remain under some form of screwworm movement restriction, and TAHC's situation summary counts 16 affected counties across 37 premises.

A slow August, but the active cases are clustering

The goat case is only the third U.S. confirmation in August, after the August 5 sheep in Terrell County and the August 16 sheep in Val Verde—against 14 cases confirmed in July and 31 in June. The outbreak's overall pace keeps slowing, but the fact that both remaining active cases sit in the same county makes Val Verde the current focal point for treatment and surveillance crews.

Every confirmed U.S. case so far has involved a domestic animal—cattle, sheep, goats and dogs—with no wildlife or feral-animal infestation and no wild screwworm fly caught in any federal or state trap, the two signals officials are watching for evidence of a self-sustaining population.

Ranchers in and around the infested zones are urged to inspect animals after procedures or injuries and to report worsening or larvae-bearing wounds to a veterinarian or TAHC at (800) 550-8242 before moving any animal.