US Confirms First Human Case Of Flesh-Eating Parasite Screwworm

The first human case of a flesh eating screwworm parasite was identified by the US Department of Health and Human Services on Sunday, in a patient in Maryland who had travelled back from El Salvador.

The case was investigated by the Maryland department of health and the Centre for Disease Control and Prevention, and was confirmed to be a New World screwworm on Aug. 4, the Guardian reported.

Andrew Nixon, a spokesperson for the HHS confirmed that the risk to public health in the US from this infection was very low.

The screwworm usually infects cattle and other warm blooded animals. According to reports, cattle ranchers have stepped up their vigilance regarding this infection as it is spreading further north from Central America and Mexico.

Screwworms are a breed of parasitic blowfly that lay eggs in open wounds of warm blooded animals. Many blowfly larvae hatch from these eggs and start eating away at the flesh and living tissue around them, which can eventually prove fatal to the host if left untreated.

Their name comes from their feeding pattern which involves burrowing into the host body's flesh akin to a screw being twisted in. Treatment of this disease involves removing hundreds of these larvae from the patient's wounds and disinfecting them.

This parasitic infection is not contagious as the screwworm is an insect, not a virus, and cannot spread from one human to another.

Efforts to combat the screwworm in the US include a sterile fly factory set up in Moore Air Force Base, Edinburg, Texas which would take around two to three years to become operational.