USDA to Reopen Major New Mexico Cattle Port Despite Fresh Screwworm Case
25 September 2026, Mexico: The US Department of Agriculture is proceeding with plans to reopen a major livestock port of entry in New Mexico to cattle imports from Mexico, even after confirming a New World screwworm detection in a horse in Grant County, in the state’s southwestern corner near the Mexican border, according to trade press reports citing a USDA social media announcement.
The agency intends to resume cattle imports at the New Mexico port in the week following the announcement, continuing a phased reopening of border crossings that the US closed to Mexican livestock roughly a year ago specifically to keep New World screwworm, a flesh-eating livestock parasite, out of the country. The parasite had been spreading northward through Mexico and Central America, prompting Washington to suspend all cattle, bison and horse imports from Mexico as a precaution.
The first port to reopen under the phased plan was Douglas, Arizona, which resumed accepting Mexican cattle on August 24 under what USDA describes as a jointly agreed, science-based import protocol with Mexican authorities, including inspection and treatment safeguards designed to catch infested animals before they cross. Further reopenings, including ports at Santa Teresa and Columbus in New Mexico, are contingent on what USDA calls satisfactory progress against a set of priority milestones in its broader screwworm action plan.
A parasite still active near the border
The Grant County detection, in a horse rather than cattle, illustrates that the pest remains active close to the reopened trade corridor even as the phased reopening continues. Texas has separately established designated screwworm-infested zones along stretches of its border with Mexico in recent weeks as USDA continues to monitor and respond to new cases. USDA has said its highest priority remains protecting the United States and that it is adjusting the geographic area over which it releases sterile flies, a decades-old and generally effective control method for the parasite, based on the latest case data and disease modelling rather than on a fixed timetable.
New World screwworm was eradicated from the United States decades ago through a sustained sterile-fly release programme along the Mexico border, and its re-emergence in Mexico over the past two years has been treated by US animal health authorities as a serious threat to the domestic cattle industry, not merely a Mexican problem. Infested animals suffer severe, often fatal wounds as fly larvae feed on living tissue, and outbreaks in cattle herds can be costly and slow to control.
Tight US cattle supply raises the stakes
The reopening decision comes as the US cattle herd sits at its smallest size since 1951, at roughly 86.2 million head, according to USDA inventory data widely reported this year, a contraction that has pushed beef prices higher and made access to Mexican feeder cattle, a traditional source of supply for US feedlots, more commercially important than usual. That tension between disease risk and supply need appears to be shaping USDA’s calculus in pressing ahead with reopenings even as new screwworm cases continue to surface.
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