USDA announces $750M sterile fly breeding program to protect cattle from Mexican flesh-eating maggots

The United States plans to breed thousands of sterile flies in a southern Texas factory in an effort to protect American cattle from flesh-eating maggots in Mexico.

The New World screwworm is a “devastating pest,” the U.S. Department of Agriculture said in a news release this week. 

“When NWS fly larvae (maggots) burrow into the flesh of a living animal, they cause serious, often deadly damage to the animal. NWS can infest livestock, pets, wildlife, occasionally birds and, in rare cases, people. It is not only a threat to our ranching community, but it is a threat to our food supply and our national security.”

Factory construction is expected to cost $750 million, and it would be located at Moore Air Force Base outside Edinburg, Texas, about 20 miles north of the border. 

Technicians prepare bait to attract flies near a cattle auction in Hermosillo, Sonora state, Mexico, in July.  (AP Photo/Fernando Llano)

The parasite has hit Mexican cattle industry hard, and Mexico’s agriculture ministry said it plans to take steps to mitigate the problem. 

The New World screwworm was a problem in the American cattle industry until it was largely eradicated in the 1970s through the breeding of sterile flies, and factories were shut down afterward.