Country Veterinary Service

10/14/2026

Dogs eat grass behavior is common and usually normal, with various reasons behind it, including instincts, curiosity, and dietary needs.
Reasons for Dogs Eating Grass
Dogs may eat grass instinctively, a behavior derived from their wolf ancestors, who occasionally consumed plant material.Some dogs eat grass to supplement missing nutrients, especially fiber, if their diet lacks certain components.Dogs primarily pass grass undigested, indicating they do not fully digest it, despite evolving some carbohydrate digestion abilities.Grass-eating can be influenced by hunger and time of day, decreasing after meals and later in the day.Curiosity and exploring behavior, especially in younger dogs, can lead them to eat grass, similar to exploring other objects.Attention-seeking from pet parents can encourage grass-eating if dogs learn it produces interaction or treats.
Do Dogs Eat Grass to Vomit?
Most dogs do not eat grass with the intention of inducing vomiting, as evidenced by surveys and studies.Dogs often eat grass without showing signs of illness beforehand, suggesting it's not primarily a vomit-inducing behavior.
Safety Risks of Dogs Eating Grass
Pesticide treatment on grass can poison dogs; ingestion may cause salivation, nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, and decreased appetite.Contamination with f***l material may expose dogs to bacteria, parasites, and viruses, posing health risks.Large quantities of grass can cause intestinal blockages, especially if mixed with non-food items.
Recommended Actions When Dogs Eat Grass
Ensure dogs eat a balanced diet with adequate fiber to reduce grass-eating behavior.Avoid grass treated with pesticides; bring product labels to the vet if ingestion occurs.Monitor for signs of illness and contact the vet if symptoms develop, especially after pesticide exposure.Use positive reinforcement to discourage grass-eating, redirecting dogs to other behaviors.Grow your own grass for safe access or limit outdoor exploration during walks, especially after meals.

10/07/2026

09/28/2026

I have had a few people slandering Country Vet on Facebook lately. I realize people have their own opinions, but slander is illegal!!! I have also had a lady saying stem cells is a scam. Also, another vet saying it will not work at all. Well I thought I would post a case that I saw and treated with stem cells. You can see in the x-rays that this dog is bone on bone in the hips. He was having a hard time getting up and down, going upstairs, running and squatting to go to the bathroom. Please watch the short video after treatment. He is actually launching himself off the deck and having no problem!!!

09/19/2026

From Dead Heifers to a Herd-Wide Discovery
One Iowa herd investigation into Theileria orientalis started with dead heifers and thousands of ticks. What was found next offered a broader lesson about surveillance, diagnostics and managing a disease that may already be moving through the region.
By Andrea Bedford
•
September 16, 2026 10:02 AM
Cattle grazing on native, warm-season pasture. (Farm Journal)
The first clue was a Sunday-night phone call.

Dr. Dan Goehl, large animal veterinarian and owner at Canton Veterinary Clinic, was at home when one of his regular producers called in a panic. A group of yearling heifers had been turned out on grass after breeding. When the producer checked them that evening, eight were dead and several more were missing.

The initial suspicion wasn’t Theileria orientalis.

“We immediately talked about toxins,” Goehl says. “That was kind of my immediate assumption.”

The cattle were brought in from pasture the next morning for examination. That’s when the investigation took an unexpected turn.

They found an extraordinary tick burden.

“There were thousands and thousands of ticks on those animals to the point that some of them could barely hold their ears up,” Goehl recalls.

The finding shifted the investigation toward Theileria, a tick-borne protozoal infection that can cause severe anemia in cattle. The team treated the cattle to reduce the tick burden, collected ticks for testing and submitted cattle for diagnostic testing.

The results confirmed Theileria.

At the time, it was the first recognized case in Iowa for Goehl’s practice area. There had been scattered cases in Missouri, but the severity of this outbreak raised questions about both where the infection came from and how long it had been present.

The Wyoming Connection
The herd consisted of 67 yearling heifers turned out to pasture. Seventeen ultimately died.

The deaths weren’t evenly distributed.

Fifty of the heifers had been brought in from Wyoming earlier that winter. Every heifer death came from that group. None of the native heifers died. That translated to 32% mortality among the Wyoming heifers.

The group also included a bull that died, adding another complication to the pattern.

Goehl describes the outbreak as a potential “perfect storm.” His working hypothesis was that the Wyoming cattle may have been naive to the infection, encountered a higher parasite burden than they had previously experienced and were exposed to an extraordinary number of Asian longhorned ticks.

The case provided an opportunity to investigate something that was even more important than the original deaths: how widespread was Theileria exposure across the operation?

The Investigation Moves to the Pasture
The veterinary team soon realized the problem extended beyond the pasture where the deaths occurred. They went back and tested cattle across the operation, finding Theileria positivity in every pasture they examined. In one pasture, all 40 cattle tested positive. Other pastures had positivity rates of 87%, 95%, 99% and 81%.

A pasture containing calves was particularly revealing. When the calves were initially tested, 46% tested positive. Thirty days later, 97% tested positive.

The team then turned their attention to the pastures themselves, conducting tick drags with white sheets through areas where they suspected ticks might be concentrated. The results helped demonstrate how difficult it could be to identify the source of exposure by looking for ticks alone.

In the pasture associated with the original outbreak, 93% of the ticks they collected were Asian longhorned ticks. Yet in some pastures where cattle tested positive for Theileria, the team did not recover an Asian longhorned tick during their sampling.

“Just because you don’t see the tick doesn’t mean you don’t have it,” Goehl says.

ticks-collected-roller.jpg
(Ohio State)
That became one of his strongest take-home messages from the investigation.

The Asian longhorned tick can be difficult to detect because of its small size, particularly in its larval and nymphal stages. The ticks also appeared to cluster in localized areas of pasture. Cattle could encounter a heavily infested “hot spot” without the producer realizing how much exposure had occurred.

The field experience made the scale of the problem more apparent. When cattle were gathered on horseback, riders could pick up thousands of ticks on their chaps after moving through some areas.

Goehl’s conclusion was that the infection likely had been present in the area well before the dramatic mortality event brought it to everyone’s attention.

A Positive Test Isn’t the Whole Diagnosis
The case also highlights a challenge veterinarians face when Theileria is on the differential.

Clinical signs can be relatively nonspecific. Goehl describes affected cattle as off-feed, depressed animals with pale mucous membranes, sometimes with icterus. Packed cell volume can fall below 15%.

The disease can resemble anaplasmosis, another cause of severe anemia, although Goehl says there are differences in how the cattle present. Theileria has also shown up more often in younger cattle in his practice, including feeder calves.

In calves, the clinical picture can look like chronic bovine respiratory disease, making it difficult to determine whether Theileria is contributing to poor performance or mortality.

That same diagnostic challenge came up when Goehl’s practice investigated a group of 107 newly received cattle from southeast Missouri. The calves were experiencing more morbidity and mortality than the practice expected, but there was an obvious competing explanation: respiratory disease is common in newly received cattle.

Then one calf died after appearing to have chronic respiratory disease. When Goehl performed a necropsy, however, the lungs were “beautiful.” There was no obvious lung disease to explain why the calf had continued to struggle.

By that point, Goehl had already seen Theileria in calves in the area, so the team added it to the investigation. They began testing the cattle for both Theileria and anaplasmosis.

The team later compared Theileria-positive cattle with their treatment histories to see whether positivity was associated with cattle that had been treated for respiratory disease. They did not find a clear pattern.

The case highlights the importance of broadening the differential when a calf shows signs of chronic respiratory disease but lacks the expected lung lesions, particularly in an area where Theileria is present. A positive test should then be interpreted alongside the animal’s clinical presentation, degree of anemia, exposure history and other potential causes of disease.

Prevention May Be More Useful Than Treatment
Once cattle develop severe clinical disease, options become limited.

Goehl’s practice has used ivermectin-class products to reduce tick burdens, along with supportive approaches and, in selected severe cases, whole-blood transfusions. The practice has not seen a consistently high success rate with transfusion, which Goehl believes may partly reflect how late treatment is initiated.

“For the cows that we’ve performed transfusions on, we’ve started too late,” he says.

That leaves tick management as one of the most practical tools available.

Pasture burning can be highly effective where it is feasible. Managing brush, broadleaf vegetation and moist areas can also reduce habitats favorable to ticks. Rotational grazing may help by managing vegetation and reducing favorable tick habitats.

Chemical control can be more complicated. Spraying may have limited effectiveness because it is difficult to pe*****te the vegetation where ticks are concentrated. Goehl suggests organophosphates may provide better tick control than pyrethrins, although product selection and use need to fit the operation and label.

Biosecurity is another piece of the puzzle.

The Asian longhorned tick is the primary biological transmission concern, but blood-transfer routes such as stable flies, needles, tattoo equipment and other shared equipment can contribute to mechanical transmission.

However, the greater concern may be on the western edge of the tick’s range, where an infected animal could enter a population that has little or no previous exposure.

Preparing for an Endemic Disease
Goehl expects Theileria to become endemic in his region. As exposure becomes more common, he believes the disease may eventually resemble anaplasmosis, becoming another endemic cause of anemia that veterinarians routinely consider.

That doesn’t mean producers should ignore the disease.

Instead, the Iowa case suggests that the biggest risk may come from assuming the problem isn’t present because the evidence isn’t obvious.

“The big take-home to our producers is that just because you don’t see the tick doesn’t mean you don’t have it,” Goehl says.

That means keeping Theileria on the differential when cattle present with unexplained anemia, poor performance or death, particularly in younger or newly introduced cattle. It also means looking beyond the individual animal and asking where the cattle came from, what pastures they have occupied and whether tick exposure could have occurred even when ticks aren’t readily visible.

The disease may already be moving through a herd long before the first dramatic mortality event makes it impossible to ignore.

Goehl’s advice is therefore less about panicking over the next dead animal and more about recognizing a slower-moving change in the disease landscape: improve surveillance, manage tick habitat, reduce opportunities for blood transfer and use diagnostics when the clinical picture doesn’t fit.

The ticks may be small. The lesson from this herd was not.

09/18/2026

AVMA News
CDC: Rabies exposures have increased, including from variety of species
Published on September 11, 2026
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) issued a health advisory on September 10 about a nationwide increase in reported human rabies exposures. The federal health agency also warned about rabies post-exposure prophylaxis (PEP) administration errors.

From July through August, the CDC received 17% more rabies-related inquiries than during the same period in 2025. At the same time, local health departments have reported increases in human rabies exposures, including from animals in which rabies is uncommon.

Since July, several high-profile rabies outbreaks and mass rabies exposure events have occurred, prompting the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to highlight the importance of performing careful rabies risk assessments and following evidence-based recommendations for administering post-exposure prophylaxis.
Since July, several high-profile rabies outbreaks and mass rabies exposure events have occurred, prompting the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to highlight the importance of performing careful rabies risk assessments and following evidence-based recommendations for administering post-exposure prophylaxis.
Health departments in North Carolina, for instance, recently investigated an incident associated with a mobile petting zoo where multiple patrons were ultimately exposed to rabies-positive baby goats, according to the state's Department of Health and Human Services (NCDHHS). Rabies shots have been recommended for more than 260 people.

Additionally, since July, two people were attacked by rabid beavers at a Maryland state park, a south New Jersey man was bitten on the leg by a rabid raccoon, and an unknown animal—either a gray fox or a fisher—has reportedly attacked three people in New Hampshire.

The CDC says it has received reports from at least eight state health departments of increased rabies PEP use, PEP administration errors, or both in the past three months.

Each year, about 1.4 million people in the United States seek medical care after suspected contact with a rabid animal, and about 100,000 people receive PEP treatment, according to the CDC. Fewer than 10 rabies deaths are reported each year.

According to weekly pharmacy data, the CDC says as of September 2, use of the two rabies vaccines and the two human rabies immune globulins (HRIGs) has increased by an estimated 33% and 76%, respectively, compared with the same period last year.

"Although there is currently no shortage of human rabies vaccine or human rabies immunoglobulin in the United States, it is important for clinicians to administer PEP appropriately because errors in rabies risk assessment and PEP administration could result in unnecessary treatment (e.g., additional doses of vaccine or HRIG), potential adverse effects, and avoidable costs,” the health advisory stated, noting that a typical course of PEP can cost up to $14,000 per person.

Among animals, there were 3,834 reported cases of rabies in the U.S. in 2024.

The AVMA policy on "Rabies" states: "Rabies is an almost invariably fatal disease for animals and humans. AVMA endorses the 2016 Compendium of Animal Rabies Prevention and Control developed by the National Association of State Public Health Veterinarians. Vaccination of animals is a critical step in preventing infection and protecting public health."

09/15/2026

AVMA News
In the three months since New World screwworm (NWS) was detected in the U.S., dozens of cases have been detected in cattle, sheep, goats, and a handful of dogs, mostly in Texas. The U.S. Department of Agriculture is spending more than $1 billion to fight the deadly parasite’s reappearance. AVMA News spoke with experts and reviewed historical documents to better understand what it took to eradicate screwworm the first time from the U.S., what efforts are happening now to detect and control its spread, and how long it will take to get NWS out of the country. This is the first article in our three-part series.

A historical perspective on New World screwworm
Screwworm's return to the U.S. echoes a battle fought—and won—decades ago
By Malinda Larkin
Published on September 08, 2026
Updated on September 11, 2026

When asked how many cases of New World screwworm (NWS) in the U.S. would be acceptable, Dr. Pancho Hubert doesn't mince words: "I think one case is bad."

The Texas VMA president remembers the devastation caused by NWS incursions while growing up in Texas in the 1960s and 1970s.

In 1962, the U.S. reported 51,592 NWS cases, 96% of which were in Texas, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture's (USDA's) National Agriculture Library (NAL). By 1972, there were more than 95,000 reported NWS cases—90,980 of which were in Texas.

An undated photo of a Texas cattleman roping a calf to be inspected for New World screwworm (NWS) (Photos courtesy of the U.S. Department of Agriculture National Agricultural Library’s Special Collections)
An undated photo of a Texas cattleman roping a calf to be inspected for New World screwworm (NWS) (Photos courtesy of the U.S. Department of Agriculture National Agricultural Library’s Special Collections)
"We were treating a lot of screwworm cases. It was mostly cattle. It really decimated livestock and wildlife," Dr. Hubert said. "There was a lot of collateral damage with an infestation of that magnitude."

AVMA News reviewed historical documents from the NAL’s "STOP Screwworms: Selections from the Screwworm Eradication Collection" and elsewhere to get a larger perspective on how the deadly parasite first emerged as a major threat in the U.S. and how it was successfully eradicated, later providing a blueprint for today's efforts against NWS.

Early treatment options

Screwworm has been present in the western U.S. at least since 1825, according to a 2006 JAVMA article by James L. Alexander, PhD, of the Texas Department of State Health Services.

However, it wasn’t until 1933 that the pest was first documented as a significant problem in the Southeast, following shipments of infested animals from the Southwest.

"The southern portion of Florida is at a latitude that enabled screwworm populations to over-winter," Dr. Alexander wrote. "Prior to the movement of affected livestock, the insect had not been able to migrate eastward far enough to establish over-wintering populations."

In response to the rapidly expanding NWS affected areas, the USDA and southeastern states created the Screwworm Educational Program in 1935 to teach livestock producers how to prevent infestations, according to the USDA's "NWS Historical Economic Impact" document. They were encouraged to calf, brand, and dehorn outside of fly season and avoid wounds when possible.

Initially, the only two effective wound treatments were benzol, to kill the worms, and pine tar oil, to repel flies and aid in healing the wound. These required daily application and confinement of the wounded animal.

Looking for more effective treatments, one USDA entomologist, Edward F. Knipling, PhD, studied various larvicides. By 1941, he and other investigators had developed a targeted NWS insecticide they named Smear 62.

"It was a thin paste formed from a combination of diphenylamine, benzol, turkey red oil, and lampblack. Although this worked better than the previous combination, it still did not kill the fly. A full-scale eradication of the screwworm was needed," according to NAL's "Southeastern United States Collection: Screwworm Eradication Program Records."

Sterile insect technique

In 1933, another USDA entomologist, Emory C. Cushing, PhD, and Walter S. Patton, PhD, a scientist at the University of Liverpool in England, published their discovery that the New World screwworm is a distinct species from the common blowfly. One key difference being that the NWS feeds on living, not dead, tissue.

Edward F. Knipling, PhD (center), conferring with his research team on Sanibel Island, Florida
Edward F. Knipling, PhD (center), conferring with his research team on Sanibel Island, Florida
"Cushing and Patton's discovery in that the screwworm was a different species ignited USDA research on treatment and control. One dilemma facing scientists was that live animals were the only way to produce screwworms for experiments, an inhumane and costly practice," according to the NAL's screwworm documents. "Entomologist Raymond C. Bushland developed an artificial screwworm-rearing medium consisting of ground meat, beef blood, water, and a small amount of formaldehyde. This solution allowed production of a large number of screwworms at minimum cost."

Also around this time, Dr. Knipling had theorized that the screwworm population could be eradicated by inundating the wild population with sterile males, known as the sterile insect technique (SIT). But the question of how to sterilize mass quantities of screwworm flies remained. Then came World War II, effectively halting NWS research until the late 1940s.
In 1946, geneticist Hermann Joseph Muller, PhD, won the Nobel Prize for his discovery that X-ray irradiation creates genetic mutations. It wasn't until 1950, though, when Dr. Muller published an article investigating the sterilization of fruit flies by radiation that USDA investigators realized they had found their answer. Dr. Knipling wrote to Dr. Muller, who encouraged the USDA researcher and his colleagues to try the technique with screwworms.

"Following Knipling's correspondence with Muller concerning the use of radiation to sterilize screwworms in large numbers, Bushland put the idea to the test. Using x-ray equipment from a nearby Army hospital, he and D.E. Hopkins, both in Kerrville, Texas, exposed screwworm flies to radiation, discovering that the flies could be sterilized at certain doses without other serious damage," according to the collection.

Experiments in the early 1950s confirmed the success of the SIT, and the first eradication program using the SIT technology started in 1957 in the southeast. The program lasted nearly two years and cost the federal government and state of Florida $10 million, according to NAL documents. The success of that eradication program led to one for the Southwest in 1962, which lasted four years and cost $32 million.

"Once the United States was free of self-sustaining screwworm populations, a barrier zone was established between Mexico and the United States by releasing sterile male flies in northern Mexico, primarily in the border areas. Releasing the flies deterred the buildup of the natural screwworm population along the Mexico and United States border," NAL documents state.

Maintaining a barrier

Even though the U.S. was declared officially free of indigenous screwworms in 1966, that wasn't the end of it. The NWS barrier zone was large and difficult to maintain.

A map of NWS cases in 1972 in the U.S.
A map of NWS cases in 1972 in the U.S.
Sterile fly production at the Mission, Texas, facility amounted to nearly 200 million flies weekly from 1972-75. In 1975 and 1976, production of sterile flies was reduced to 165 million weekly to save money, and reported cases increased significantly. In addition, from 1971-76, winters were gentle and summers mild in the southwest U.S and northern Mexico, with above normal precipitation, according to records from the time.

"Probably because of the favourable weather, the Gulf Coast ear tick, Amblyomma maculatum, began to increase and spread, infesting large areas in Texas in 1972. Ticks created wounds for screwworms in record numbers from late July to the end of October each year from 1972 to 1976. These additional wounds for screwworm oviposition contributed to additional loss of effectiveness in screwworm control," according to the report, "Screwworm control and eradication in the southern United States of America." "Interest in the development of new and improved screwworm control methods resulted, for example, in the control of the Gulf Coast ear tick by insecticide-impregnated plastic ear tags for cattle."

The last natural incursion of screwworm into the continental United States was from Mexico, which occurred in August 1982 in Starr County, Texas. For more than three decades, only 27 NWS cases had been detected in the U.S., including Puerto Rico, USDA information states.

Then in 2016, an outbreak occurred in the Florida Keys, Florida. In total, there were 145 cases: 128 presumptive cases and 17 confirmed cases of NWS, with the majority (135) of those observed in Key deer, according to an APHIS report.

Otherwise, the SIT had effectively eradicated NWS out of North America and Central America all the way south to the Darien Gap, at the southern end of Panama. The Panama-United States Commission for the Eradication and Prevention of Screwworm has been producing sterile flies since the '90s to maintain this barrier. But in 2023, health authorities noticed incursions of NWS north of the area where the SIT flies were distributed.

By November 2024, a confirmed NWS case in a cow in the southern Mexican state of Chiapas prompted the USDA to ramp up NWS mitigation measures along the U.S. southern border.

Nearly two years later, on June 3, NWS larvae were confirmed in the umbilicus of a 3-week-old calf in Zavala County, Texas, about 45 miles east of the U.S.-Mexico border and 100 miles southwest of San Antonio.

Of the 476 total larval cases submitted to USDA's National Veterinary Services Laboratories since then, 49 have been positive NWS cases and only two of those are active currently.

A USDA Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service chart and map showing progress against NWS in the mid-20th century. In 1941, producer losses were estimated at $5-$10 million annually, nationwide, according to the report. By 1960, estimated livestock losses due to screwworm in the southwest were placed at more than $100 million annually.
A USDA APHIS chart and map showing progress against NWS in the mid-20th century. In 1941, producer losses were estimated at $5-$10 million annually, nationwide, according to the report. By 1960, estimated livestock losses due to screwworm in the southwest were placed at more than $100 million annually.
Dr. Hubert, who practices in Corpus Christi, Texas, is not in the areas directly affected, though there are some cases west of him. He says that, while a ranch's labor force may not be as numerous as it was in the 1960s and 1970s, he’s convinced the U.S. can once again be successful against NWS thanks to today’s technology and a playbook based on what worked in previous response efforts.

"If you compare back in the 70s to today, the difference is astounding. You can see large differences in the total cases of screwworm cases. But it does accentuate the importance of constant vigilance against this scourge," Dr. Hubert said. "Our goal is to get NWS out of Texas and to beat it back to Panama. That is the ultimate goal. It will take everyone’s efforts to accomplish this, including the state and federal government, veterinarians and animal health professionals and the public—in a coordinated and collaborative effort to get this scourge out of Texas."

The AVMA has created a New World screwworm (NWS) page that includes the following resources and more:

Companion animal guidance
A list of all drugs approved for use to combat NWS in animals
Travel to/from Mexico
Livestock/Equid clinical guidance
Client-facing poster: What to look for
Veterinary quick reference
Screwworm guidance for animal shelters

08/31/2026

U.S. Department of Agriculture, Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service
closeup view of New World screwworm fly on a branch
APHIS Approves Release of New World Screwworm Infested Zones in Texas
Contact: [email protected]

WASHINGTON, D.C., August 31, 2026—The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) has approved the release of two New World screwworm (NWS) infested zones in Texas, following concurrence from Texas’s State Veterinarian, Dr. Bud Dinges, and the Texas Animal Health Commission (TAHC). This marks a significant milestone: the first NWS infested zones to be released in Texas since the first case was detected in Texas on June 3.

“The Texas Animal Health Commission has been an outstanding partner throughout our response to New World screwworm. Their vigilance, on‑the‑ground expertise, and unwavering commitment to protecting livestock and wildlife have been essential to our shared success,” said Under Secretary for Marketing and Regulatory Programs Dudley Hoskins. “Thanks to this strong federal-state partnership, we’ve been able to identify cases early, respond aggressively, and slow the spread of NWS across affected areas. Today’s milestone demonstrates the power of coordinated action—showing producers, communities, and the nation that when we work together, we can protect animal health and maintain continuity of business even in challenging situations.”

The two zones being released are:

Infested Zone 02.A (including portions of La Salle and Webb counties)
Infested Zone 03 (including portions of Gillespie, Kerr, and Kimble counties)
This action comes after state and federal subject matter experts confirmed that the two areas met all requirements outlined in APHIS’ New World Screwworm Response Playbook (884.59 KB) for zone release.

As cases have been confirmed in Texas, TAHC and APHIS have worked together, establishing infested zones and carrying out essential response activities, including:

Establishing domestic animal movement requirements with inspections
Wildlife and fly surveillance
Strategic releases of sterile NWS flies
Releasing these zones removes NWS‑related movement requirements for livestock and pets within the released areas, allowing producers to resume normal intrastate and interstate movement without NWS inspection. All non-NWS-related interstate movement requirements and international export requirements will still apply.

Several infested zones in Texas remain in place, and APHIS continues to work closely with TAHC to evaluate conditions for future zone releases. All Texas animal owners should visit the TAHC website to ensure they have the latest information about the location of infested zones, movement requirements, and zone‑specific requirements.

APHIS and TAHC remain committed to supporting continuity of business for producers, and will continue applying science‑based surveillance, early detection, and rapid response measures to ensure that areas are released as soon as the criteria have been met.

For more information about NWS and updated response activities, please visit screwworm.gov and the TAHC New World Screwworm resource page.