Travis County Judge Andy Brown signed a declaration of disaster on June 12 due to a rise in infections in Texas of the New World screwworm. The declaration will expire in seven days unless renewed.
The screwworm is a parasitic fly that feeds on the tissue of warm-blooded animals and people, and begins when a female screwworm lays her eggs in open wounds, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
According to the United States Department of Agriculture, 12 total animal cases have been confirmed in the U.S., with 11 from Texas. While there are no confirmed cases in Travis County or Austin, according to the declaration of disaster, “Travis County is vulnerable to significant harm to livestock, agriculture, wildlife resources, wildlife, related business activity, and property interests if the threat of NWS materializes within the County.”
Radio-television-film sophomore Anthony Chapa has cared for horses since he was a child. He said he has to be “wary” about which counties he enters with his horses relative to their risk of infection. He and his family have been covering any small cuts they see on their eight horses and checking their bodies twice a week to confirm there is no risk of a screwworm infection.
USDA is investing in dispersing sterile insects so that the population of screwworms will gradually decline. This technique was successfully used in the 1960s to eradicate the U.S. populations of the New World screwworm, and was built on the research of UT professor and researcher Hermann Muller.
The Texas Animal Health Commission has announced a quarantine for warm-blooded animals in infected counties. Austin Wildlife Rescue announced that due to the quarantine, they can no longer accept rescued animals from those areas.
“The biggest effect, just knowing about the infestations that have been happening, is being more wary of everything,” Chapa said. “It kind of sticks in the back of your mind, but we just try our best to keep them safe and do whatever we can to just not let it happen to our horses.”
