Earlier this week, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) confirmed the first human case of a flesh-eating parasite in the U.S. The patient, a Maryland resident, had recently returned from travel to El Salvador and was found to be infected with New World screwworm, an HHS spokesperson told ABC News.

The patient had traveled to Central America, where an outbreak of myiasis, an infection by screwworm larvae, has been ravaging livestock.

A rare case of travel-related New World screwworm was identified in Maryland in a patient who traveled from El Salvador, a spokesman from the US Department of Health and Human Services said.