A flesh-eating screwworm has been identified in the United States cattle herd.

On Friday, June 5th, the USDA announced that it had identified a second case of the worm in the herd, this time in a one-month-old calf.

The USDA stressed in the statement that the second case occurred in an area already covered in the enforcement area of the first case. Sterile flies were already being released in the area to reduce the pest’s population.

The screwworm has previously been exterminated from the United States herd since 1966. There were rare but vigorous breakouts in the 1970s, culling tens of thousands of cows.

The last break into the US cattle supply was confirmed by the USDA in 1982.

Critics of the current administration were quick to point out that one of the efforts slashed in DOGE’s budget cuts last year was, in fact, an effort to track and curb the spread of the worm throughout Mexico and Central America.

These efforts included releasing sterile and irradiated specimens as natural buffers. For decades, the scourge of screwworms was pushed further south. The barrier was eventually pushed down to the Panama Canal.

For the time being, the USDA frames keeping the event at two cases as a victory. However, the screwworm has a history of premature claims to success.

The fly from which the parasite is hatched can travel 12 miles in a single fly’s lifetime. With the rather fleeting life cycle of flies, the parasite can conquer regions in a single especially aggressive breeding season.

Just on the other side of the Rio Grande, thousands of active cases exist in Mexico.

It holds dark parallels to the escalating crisis of the worm in the early 2020s, when it successfully escaped the Panama Canal containment through largely unknown means.

It is known that mismanagement at a time of another poly-crisis (COVID-19) and unusually immense human and animal movement through the largely inhospitable Darien Pass played a role.

It has now squirmed into a nation locked in record military spending and economic uncertainty— a people disinterested in the effective, unglamorous parts of government— like managing flesh-eating flies.

Infection and disease are most insidious in moments that are otherwise occupied.

But now is not the time for convenient negligence.

As of the start of this year, there were 86.2 million cattle in the American herd.

This represents a 75-year low for the herd.

In 1951, the United States had a population of about 151 million. A little less than half the current figure.

While meat and cruelty-free diets have certainly increased in vogue, and animal husbandry practices themselves have progressed to allow for a far larger yield per animal and a detectable market segment being disinterested in the product– these forces alone are not enough to protect the already strained consumer.

The price of beef has gone up 75% since December of 2020. Well before worms entered the American market of beef demand. A full outbreak would only be more strain on consumers facing record prices.

Policymakers must ask challenging questions, such as if lentils, beans and rice can constitute a beef-based diet.