The U.S. in late November restricted the import of live cattle and bison from Mexico due to detection of New World screwworm in the southern Mexico state of Chiapas at an inspection point close to the border with Guatemala.
Already high feeder cattle futures and cash prices
jumped in the weeks that followed
. U.S. inventories of beef cattle are at all-time lows, and feedlots have been purchasing Mexican cattle to fill demand.
But what is New World screwworm? And why has the U.S. been so diligent at keeping it out? Here are some facts from the
U.S. Department of Agriculture
:
What are NWS?
NWS are fly larvae that infest living tissue of warm-blooded animals, causing infection, which can cause potentially deadly damage to the animal.
Where are NWS?
Where New World screwworm had been found, as of Dec. 7, 2024.
Courtesy / USDA
NWS thrives in warm climates and occurs regularly in Cuba, Haiti, the Dominican Republic, and countries in South America. According to the USDA, Panama went from an average of 25 cases per year to more than 6,500 cases in 2023. Through Dec. 4, 2024, there had been 105 cases in Honduras, 6,436 cases in Nicaragua, 11,627 cases in Costa Rica, 22,611 cases in Panama, 32 cases in Guatemala and two cases in Mexico, according to the
Panama-United States Commission for the Eradication and Prevention of Screwworm, or COPEG
.
Why hasn’t NWS been a problem in the U.S. in decades?
The USDA eradicated NWS from the United States in 1966 using sterile insect technique, in which sterile males are introduced into a defined area, where they mate with wild females, resulting in no offspring.
Since then, the U.S. has worked with Panama through COPEG to prevent northward movement of the insect. USDA’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service invested $109.8 million in 2023 to combat new NWS detections in Central America and Mexico to keep the pest from spreading into North America and
another $165 million in 2024
. The effort is centered around using the sterile insect technique, developing and enforcing animal movement controls and increasing surveillance, outreach and education in impacted areas.
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Publish date : 2024-12-17 22:35:00
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