Gov. Greg Abbott (R-TX) on Monday expanded Texas’s emergency response to the New World screwworm, as the parasitic fly’s passage across the U.S. border threatens the state’s multibillion-dollar livestock industry. 

Abbott directed Texas’s emergency operations center to activate to Level II, the “escalated response” level, to support the state’s screwworm response. Texas and federal partners at the Agriculture Department have worked for months to stave off the parasite’s arrival, as it worked its way up from South America and the Caribbean into Mexico. But on Wednesday, the first screwworm case in the United States was reported in La Pryor, Texas, prompting further action from officials. 

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