Karen Eggert (202) 690-4755
Jerry Redding (202) 720-4623
USDA-PANAMA SCREWWORM FACILITY INAUGURATED TODAY
PACORA, Panama, July 12, 2006--U.S. Department of Agriculture representatives joined Panamanian President Martin Torrijos, U.S. Ambassador to Panama William Eaton and Panamanian agriculture officials to inaugurate the soon-to-be-completed Panama Mass Rearing and Research Facility devoted to studying and producing New World screwworms, Cochliomyia hominivorax (Coquerel).
The center will be jointly run by USDA’s Animal and Health Inspection Service and the U.S.-Panamanian Commission for the Eradication and Prevention of Screwworms, also known as COPEG (Comisión Panamá-Estados Unidos para la Erradicación y Prevención del Gusano Barrenador del Ganado). COPEG is located in Pacora, about 25 miles east of its current temporary quarters in Panama City. Scientists with USDA's Agricultural Research Service will be located in the new facility to provide continuing research support.
“This facility represents a decade-long international cooperative effort to eliminate screwworm,” said USDA Under Secretary for Marketing and Regulatory Programs Chuck Lambert. “Together, we are gradually eradicating this costly pest of livestock and wildlife from tropical and subtropical North and South American regions, but more remains to be done.”
Screwworm eradication efforts save U.S. livestock producers at least $900 million annually.
Screwworm is a parasite that affects mammals. Screwworm larvae hatch from eggs laid by flies on host animals--often in, or adjacent to, open wounds--and feed on their flesh, causing great suffering and losses. Many cases of humans being infested with screwworms have also been reported.
Central to eradication efforts has been the mass-rearing of trillions of C. hominivorax flies. Healthy flies, made sexually sterile, are then air-shipped to other facilities for release in support of screwworm control programs. The new $40-million, 210-acre facility will house more than 250 employees and will be able to produce up to 150 million sterilized flies per week at full capacity.
The Mexican-American Commission for the Eradication of Screwworm was formed on Aug. 28, 1972, at the request of Mexican livestock producers, to carry the U.S. eradication program south to the Isthmus of Tehuantepec. The program now extends all the way through
Panama, where biological control workers are maintaining a barrier at the Darien Gap adjacent to
Colombia . USDA research and leadership of intensive interagency eradication efforts have kept Puerto Rico screwworm-free since 1976; the United States, since 1982; Mexico, since 1991; Belize and Guatemala since 1994, El Salvador since 1995, Honduras since 1996, Nicaragua since 1999, Costa Rico since 2000, Aruba since 2005 and Panama since 2006.
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