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Quick takes: Minnesota measles clusters, New World screwworm in elk, Salmonella tied to oysters
News briefToday at 3:02 p.m.
Stephanie Soucheray, MA
Topics
Measles
New World Screwworm
Salmonella
- Minnesota is reporting 25 recent measles cases in two clusters, raising the state total to 42 infections in 2026. All 25 new cases were in unvaccinated people, including six in Fillmore County and 19 in Todd County. “There are pockets of unvaccinated or under-vaccinated people across Minnesota, and anyone who isn't vaccinated against measles is at risk—especially right now,” the Minnesota Department of Health said in a statement. The United States has seen more than 4,400 measles cases so far this year, the most in more than three decades.
- Yesterday state and federal officials in Texas confirmed the first detection of New World screwworm (NWS) in US wildlife. The case involves a female elk at a game ranch in Pecos County. NWS has been detected in Texas livestock since it was first reported in June. Officials are warning hunters to look for signs of NWS in animals, including maggots in wounds and infestations near the nose, mouth, ears, eyes, or genital areas. The parasitic fly burrows in wounds and orifices of warm-blooded animals.
- The Virginia Department of Health yesterday said 55 Salmonella Telelkebir cases in 19 states have been reported in an outbreak linked to eating raw oysters, but the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is still reporting only 27 cases in 12 states. The waters in the Little Wicomico River in Northumberland County, Virginia, are still closed to harvesting of oysters and clams because of the outbreak.
First ever human case of livestock-related Shamonda virus identified in France
News briefToday at 2:57 p.m.
Meghan Holohan
Topics
Public Health
For the first time, a person has contracted Shamonda virus (SHAV), according to the French government. Typically, the orthobunyavirus infects only farm animals. This summer, for the first time, the virus was found in livestock in Europe, per the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC).
“Until now, the Shamonda virus was considered non-transmissible to humans,” said a translated news release from the French Ministry of Agriculture and Food Sovereignty. “This patient’s infection with the Shamonda virus thus constitutes the first documented and reported detection of the virus in humans.”
Patient had weakened immune system
The patient had a “serious [underlying] illness that made them more susceptible to infection and complications than the general population,” the ECDC said. Since the man died in a Lyon hospital in early October, experts have been investigating whether the virus led to his death and how he contracted it.The patient had developed neurologic complications that experts believe was connected to the SHAV infection. In livestock, the virus can cause fever, diarrhea, loss of appetite, reduced milk yield, stillbirth, and congenital abnormalities. No antiviral treatment or vaccine is available.
The risk to the general public appears very low for several reasons.
Tom Solomon, PhD
Infected Culicoides midges, also known as biting midges, typically transmit SHAV to livestock and from animal to animal. The ECDC said the species involved in this human case is currently unknown. Biting midges are normally more active from spring to fall and become less active as the weather cools.
“The risk to the general public appears very low for several reasons,” Tom Solomon, PhD, director of The Pandemic Institute and National Institute for Health Research Health Protection Research Unit in Emerging and Zoonotic Infections, University of Liverpool, told the Science Media Centre in the United Kingdom.
“Shamonda virus has been circulating in animals, particularly cattle, but also sheep, goats, horses and alpacas, for many years, yet this is the first recognized human infection,” he added. “This suggests that transmission to humans is extremely unusual.”
CWD digest: Disease reaches new areas in Wyoming, Wisconsin, as Michigan detects case on farm
News briefToday at 12:23 p.m.
Mary Van Beusekom, MS
Topics
Chronic Wasting Disease
Chronic wasting disease (CWD) has spread to a new deer hunt area in Wyoming, another Wisconsin county, and a Michigan farm, state officials announced this week.
- Wyoming: “The Wyoming Game and Fish Department has confirmed the presence of chronic wasting disease in Deer Hunt Area 141 in the Pinedale Region,” a departmental news release said. “Deer Hunt Area 141 is bordered by CWD-positive deer hunt areas 128 (positive in 2016), 142 (positive in 2020), 154 (positive in 2022) and 155 (positive in 2022).” The release gave no other details. The Pinedale region is in the western part of the state, in the upper Green River Valley in Sublette County. It is not the county’s first detection, with a case identified in Elk Hunt Area 98 in January 2025.
- Wisconsin: The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources has confirmed the first positive CWD test in Marinette County, in a wild 3-year-old buck. The county is in the northeastern part of the state and borders Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. As a result of the detection, the current feeding and baiting ban in Marinette will be extended for another three years.
- Michigan: The Michigan Department of Agriculture and Rural Development has detected CWD in a farmed cervid (member of the deer family) in Hillsdale County. The case was identified through the state’s CWD surveillance program, according to an Agriculture and Rural Development press release. Hillsdale County is in the south-central part of Michigan’s Lower Peninsula, bordering Indiana and Ohio. CWD infections in farmed cervids have also been found in Calhoun, Kent, Lake, Mackinac, Mecosta, Montcalm, Newaygo, and Osceola counties.
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